Home Alone star recalls Joe Pesci biting Macaulay Culkin’s finger during filming: ‘He’s a scary dude’

Home Alone co-star Daniel Stern has recounted the time Joe Pesci accidentally, and surprisingly, bit Macaulay Culkin’s finger while filming one of the Christmas classic’s intimidation scenes.

Stern, 67, and Pesci, 81, co-starred in the 1990 holiday comedy as the Wet Bandits, two criminals who target the home of Culkin’s character, 8-year-old Kevin McCallister. In order to protect his family home, Kevin sets up a series of booby traps to fend off the conmen.

Stern was reminded on Entertainment Tonight of the very up-close encounter with Pesci, which Culkin recently revealed left him with a scar.

“I totally forgot about that,” Stern said.

“Joe is … he’s wonderful, I love him, he’s a dear friend, but he’s a scary dude,” said Stern. “He was carrying it all. We were trying in the first movie to actually be scary to start with, and then you realize we’re idiots. But there was a fear factor that set up the drama of the thing,” Stern continued.

Pesci appeared to bite Culkin’s finger in the scene, then he actually “ bit it — like, ‘Oh crap, I didn’t really mean to,’” Stern recounted. “Joe was like, ‘Ahh, sorry I did that.’ But the only time you might see Pesci break” character, he added.

During a recent question and answer, the now-44-year-old Culkin remembered the scene when bandits have his character up against a door, with Pesci’s Harry threatening to bite Kevin’s finger off.

“He was trying to scare me,” the My Girl star recalled. “He was like, I want to be menacing to this kid. I saw his face — and I’ve never, ever seen Joe Pesci actually scared. Because he’s like, I just bit a kid!”

Culkin was only 10 years old when he starred opposite Pesci and Stern in the first Home Alone . The trio later returned for its 1992 sequel, Lost in New York.

In 2022, Pesci recalled limiting his interactions with Culkin on set during the sequel “to preserve the dynamic between his character, Kevin, and my character, Harry.”

The Oscar-winning Goodfellas actor said he didn’t want “it to come across on the screen that we were in any way friendly.”

“I wanted to maintain the integrity of the adversarial relationship,” he explained.

Still, he recalled Culkin as being a “really sweet kid and, even at his age, very professional.”

Earlier this month, the actors who played Kevin’s siblings and cousins reunited for the first time in 30 years for a special meet and greet with fans at Pandora’s Box Toys & Collectibles in Lafayette, New Jersey.

The store’s Instagram account documented the event, noting: “Guys, I’m eating junk and watching rubbish! You better come out and stop me!!!” parroting Macaulay’s character.

“Today’s event was so much fun! Thank you to [actors] Devin Ratray @devinratray, Kristin Minter @kristin_minter, Michael C Maronna, Angela Goethals @g0ethals, Jed Cohen and everyone who came out to ... celebrate their Home Alone Fandom with all of us today here at @pandorasboxtoysandcollectibles.”