Home Alone is hilarious pranks played for gags. We know well though that in reality those culprits would never make it to another installment. Also, young Kevin McAllister would probably face trial.
Go ahead and ask Joe Pesci, who portrayed trickster Harry in the first two movies. His character stars alongside Daniel Stern as Murray’s accomplice and Macaulay Culkin as Kevin.
In honor of Home Alone 2: Lost in New York’s 30th anniversary, Pesci shared that McAllister’s conventional one-liners left him with severe burns.
In the Lost in New York scene, where Harry is again exposed to a blowtorch, he sustains the injury. Harry foils a similar prank from the first film and plunges his flaming head into the toilet. However, he did not know that “toilet water” was actually kerosene.
We would underestimate if we said the results are not good for Harry.
Although Pesci found joy in having a “change of pace” with his label of slapstick, he confessed that the “more physical type of comedy” was “a little more demanding.” Notably, he won an Oscar for his contributions to the drama Goodfellas.
“In addition to the expected bumps, bruises, and general pains that you would associate with that particular type of physical humor,” Pesci said in an interview with PEOPLE. “I did sustain serious burns to the top of my head during the scene where Harry’s hat is set on fire.”
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Lost in New York Stunt
Pesci experienced this stunt himself, but left the really difficult stunts to the pros.
He hesitated when the press asked whether he’d sport a comeback for a future Home Alone franchise film. The 79-year-old said times have evolved. And perhaps viewers aren’t so hauled up with the idea of two older adults assaulting an abandoned kid and getting their ass-s burned by the child.
“While you never say never, I think that it would be difficult to replicate not only the success but also the overall innocence of the originals,” Pesci stated. “It’s a different time now. Attitudes and priorities have changed in 30 years.”
But there’s 2021’s Home Sweet Home Alone – if you want to set your head on fire, metaphorically, of course.
Home Alone
20th Century Fox released Home Alone 2: Lost in New York in 1992, with Chris Columbus directing. John Hughes wrote and produced the Christmas comedy.
The film is the follow-up to 1990’s Home Alone. Additionally, it features Culkin, Pesci, Stern, John Heard, Tim Curry, Brenda Fricker, and Catherine O’Hara.
In addition, Lost in New York received critical and commercial success. The film earned roughly $359 million at the global box office and became the third highest-grossing movie in 1992.
But it received some criticism, pointing out its darker tone and violent scenes. Few even highlighted similarities to the first installment.
Later in 1997, the franchise released Home Alone 3 with a set of a new cast. But Devin Ratray returned as Buzz McCallister in Home Sweet Home Alone.
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