“I was paralysed for the first three minutes,” the 12-year-old British actor told news.com.au. “Then the realisation set in, and I was like, ‘I’m going to be in the next Home Alone film!’”Yates was 10 when he was cast in late-2019, not long after his breakout role as scene-stealer Yorki in Taika Waititi’s Jojo Rabbit. Two years later, his face is plastered on one of Times Square’s enormous billboards – “That’s pretty cool”.A self-confessed Christmas fan, Yates grew up “religiously” watching Macaulay Culkin’s 1990 classic slapstick tale every year, so to find himself playing the kid who is left alone to fend off intruders when his family unwittingly leaves him behind is very surreal.Perhaps not surprising, his favourite part of the job was the Looney Tunes-level shenanigans his character Max inflicts upon two hapless “villains”, portrayed by Ellie Kemper and Rob Delaney in this new version.Yates nominates the ironing board slide as the stunt he was most excited to see come alive.“So, basically, they were upside down ironing boards,” he explained. “And I’m holding onto the handles or the stands and I slide down the stairs, it’s so fun.“You need the ironing board, you need a rail attached to the ironing board, so you don’t fall off, and you need a safety team with you at all times. Emergency first aid in case the worst happens.“And you might need a funeral service.” Probably not one to try at home then.Besides the stunts, Yates loved bickering with his onscreen mum Aisling Bea, the Irish comedian, actor and writer who plays Carol.“It’s what I’ve always wanted a child of mine to say,” Bea joked, before she and Yates launches into a back-and-forth exchange of “No, we don’t” and “yes, we do” about their bickering talents.Bea said that the pair started bickering quite naturally immediately, and that chemistry is evident in the film’s early scenes. It’s a different, pricklier dynamic than Culkin and Catherine O’Hara’s in the original movie.Bea said the goal wasn’t to imitate the 1990 film but to recapture some of the magic that has seen it endure for three decades.“We’re trying to recreate the magic but we’re not trying to recreate the old film,” she said. “But we’re trying to recreate the all of the same feelings of like slapstick and from a kid’s perspective of how you defend your home, and the creativity of the stuff in your house, becoming lord of the manor.“And the magic of the door swinging open and finally being reunited [with mum] at the door.“So, we are trying to hit those moments but not tell the same story.“Max and Carol are a very different duo to Catherine O’Hara and Macaulay Culkin, and we bow down to them. And even the baddies have a very different reason for trying to get into the house.“It’s a different movie but with hopefully some similar feelings you would’ve gotten from the first two films.”Home Sweet Home Alone is streaming now on Disney+Share your movies and TV obsessions | @wenleima
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