Kieran Culkin’s Family: Meet Oscar Nominee’s Siblings, Parents & More

With three child stars in the family, the Culkin kids have been in the spotlight from a young age. Over the last few years, Kieran Culkin has been having a major resurgence thanks to his Emmy-winning role in Succession and critically acclaimed performance in the 2024 film A Real Pain.

After much success this awards season, Kieran is now a favored contender to win the award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role at the 2025 Oscars. Scroll down for everything to know about the actor’s family and some of their complicated relationships.

Kieran Culkin’s parents

Kieran’s parents are Christopher “Kit” Culkin, a former stage actor, and Patricia Brentrup. The two were together from 1974 until 1995 but never got married (although they have seven children together during their relationship). Kit’s sister is Bonnie Bedelia, an actress who starred in Parenthood, making her Kieran’s aunt.

Kieran and his siblings grew up with humble beginnings. Kit worked as a taxi driver and sacristan at a Catholic church in New York City, while Brentrup was a telephone operator. In a 2018 interview with Vanity Fair, Kieran recalled the small NYC apartment he grew up in. “It was just a hallway and there were no separating doors, except for the bathroom, which didn’t have a lock,” he shared. “They raised seven kids in that apartment for years. They just kept bringing babies home to this little space.”

The Succession star has maintained a close relationship with his mother over the years. He gushed over how “amazing” she was during an appearance at the 2024 Golden Globe Awards. While reflecting on his childhood, he once said, “If I wanted chocolate milk light, but my brother wanted more chocolate, and my sister wanted hardly any, [my mom] would make it those different ways. I love that s**t,” he said. “How did my mom do it? Yeah. And I have no idea.” Kieran was by Brentrup’s side when she was having health issues in December 2023, too, her husband told Page Six.

Related

'Succession' Star Kieran Culkin Looks Back on Amazing Cut Scene

At the 2025 Screen Actors Guild Awards, Kieran told Entertainment Weekly, “My mom used to say when I was a kid, ‘How come whenever there’s a script about a dysfunctional family they always come to us?’ What’s a functional family? Aren’t they all [dysfunctional]?”

Things are much more complicated with Kit, who is estranged from the rest of his family. “He’s not a good dude, but he wasn’t really a big part of my life after the age of 15,” Kieran told Vanity Fair. Kit had a stroke in 2014 and briefly lost all motor function. In 2021, Kieran revealed that his father came to see him in a play shortly after the stroke but said they have not spoken since.

His brother Macaulay Culkin‘s relationship with their father is even more strained, and he claimed on the WTF With Marc Maron podcast in 2018 that Kit was “physically and mentally” abusive. “He would black out all the terrible things that he did, and that hurt me more, because he’d go to bed at night thinking he was a good person,” Macaulay wrote in his 2006 book Junior,” adding, “I knew from a very early age that I better take notes on him. Notes on how not to be, notes on how I don’t want to be when I grow up.”

Kieran Culkin’s siblings

Kieran was one of eight children. Before Kit and Brentrup got together, Kit had a daughter, Jennifer Adamson, with Adeena VanWagoner. Adamson died in 2000 from a drug overdose.

In addition to Kieran and Macaulay, Kit and Brentrup also had sons Shane Culkin, Christian Culkin, and Rory Culkin, and daughters Quinn Culkin and Dakota Culkin. Dakota died at the age of 29 in 2008 when she was struck by a car in California. She had recently moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in film production.

“I accepted at the time that this is going to be forever, and it’s never going to be fine. It’s always going to be devastating,” Kieran told The Hollywood Reporter in 2021. “I still weep about it out of nowhere. Something funny she did will pop in the head and make me laugh, and then I’m weeping.”

Macaulay saw the most success as a child star in the family, starring in movies like Home Alone and My Girl. He eventually stepped back from acting following his success and appears in minimal projects these days. Instead, he’s focused on his relationship with fiancé Brenda Song and their two children (he named his eldest son Dakota after his late sister).

Teresa Barbieri/Getty Images

Rory is the youngest Culkin kid. He was also a child star, known for roles like You Can Count on Me and Signs. He also played younger versions of his older siblings in some projects. He most recently starred in the Prime Video series Swarm and married Sarah Scrivener in 2018.

Quinn mostly stays out of the spotlight, although she did have a few film credits to her name when she was younger. Shane is also more private than some of his siblings, but did star on Broadway in 1988’s Our Town. Meanwhile, Christian has one acting credit in 1994’s My Summer Story, which Kieran also starred in.

Kieran Culkin’s wife and kids

Kieran met his now-wife Jazz Charton in 2012. They first crossed paths in a bar shortly after Charton moved to New York from the U.K and eloped in 2013 in Iowa while on a road trip.

Amy Sussman/Getty Images

The couple’s daughter Kinsey was born in 2019, followed by son Wilder in 2021. When Kieran won an Emmy for Succession in January 2024, he referenced the possibility of expanding the family in his speech. “Thank you for sharing your life with me and for giving me two amazing kids,” he said to his wife. “And Jazz, I want more. You said maybe if I win!”

In a 2024 interview with the New York Times, Kieran spoke about his family. “I took a shot at the most beautiful and charismatic person I’ve ever known and she said yes to a date with me,” he said. “Now I’m married to her, so I aimed pretty high there and I ended up with my best friend and a great person. I have two beautiful kids and I want to be the best dad ever, so I work really hard at that.”