Food banks, homelessness, and family members with challenging illnesses.
Chris Pratt's life has been anything but easy.
Chris Pratt may be a Hollywood superstar now, but his upbringing was a whole lot less lavish. The
actor was raised in Lake Stevens, Washington by his mother, who worked in a supermarket,
and his late father, who worked as a miner, per Esquire. Life was not always easy in his
community, where there was a local food bank to help feed the families in need. As the
"Guardians of the Galaxy" star explained, his family was not immune to going hungry.
"I'm not ashamed to say that there were moments
when my family would need to eat from a food bank."
While doing a live chat on his Instagram with the CEO of Feeding America,
Pratt encouraged others to seek help when they needed it, too. He encouraged viewers,
"But it's important, too, to destigmatize the idea that if you need help, it's okay to accept it."
It might seem hard to believe now, but Chris Pratt spent a chunk of his early
20s without a roof over his head or a home to call his own. In fact,
the A-list celebrity once lived in a van with Scooby-Doo and Shaggy painted on the side,
as he shared on Facebook. Pratt also explained on the "SmartLess" podcast,
"I did like a semester of community college that I was paying for myself,
and I hated it. [...] I became a door-to-door salesman."
"I sold coupons. It was one of these, kind of, multi-level marketing schemes."
While Pratt did well in the job, which involved selling coupons for businesses in Colorado,
he did not succeed in breaking out on his own. One of Pratt's friends lived in Maui,
and convinced the struggling actor to move there. The star worked for
Bubba Gump Shrimp Company and camped on the beach with his pals every night. He
eventually landed his first movie role, but Pratt often found it extremely challenging
to find food during the early days of his career. On Instagram, the actor recalled,
"Fifteen years ago I felt the same passion I feel today, but I had very
little opportunity. I had to hustle hard and go hungry. I had to eat sardines and figure
out how to get gas money. [...] I never had a plan B. I never stopped believing. Ever."
Despite how difficult it was to find steady work as an actor, he refused to give up his dreams.
Chris Pratt's father, Dan Pratt, passed away after a decade-long battle with MS.
According to Chris, his father was a tough person who did not always react well to
his son's softer ways. In an interview with Men's Health, the "Everwood" star explained,
"He was a boxer and a bouncer. [...] I am a sensitive person. My dad knew
that when I was a youngster, and it kind of made him dislike me [...] because he
probably grew up in a world where a guy like that could get eaten alive."
In a candid interview with GQ, Chris also discussed his father's illness, saying,
"When he lost his ability to walk he gave up on life. Men of his ilk are defined by their
ability to provide physically for their family and when that's taken away, that was a joke to him."
Chris also indicated that his father never verbally admitted that he was proud of his
son for his achievements. However, this did not bother the "Jurassic World" actor,
as he knew that his father was pleased. As Chris told GQ,
his dad always watched whatever he starred in and kept up to date with his acting career.
Chris Pratt has an adorable son named Jack whom he shares with his former wife,
Anna Faris. While Jack is reportedly quite healthy now, according to Us Weekly,
he faced some life-threatening struggles in his formative years that ignited genuine fear
within Pratt and Faris. In her autobiography "Unqualified," Faris revealed that her son
was born prematurely, which caused him to face several health complications. She explained,
"On our fourth day in the NICU, the pediatric neurosurgeon sat Chris and me
down to tell us that Jack had some severe brain bleeding and there was a chance that
he could be developmentally disabled. [...] Chris and I did what we could,
which was hold hands and hope and face it together."
In an interview with People, Pratt described his best day, which came
with finishing up the first "Guardians of the Galaxy" movie. After filming for months on end,
Pratt was finally reunited with Faris and their son Jack. As Pratt explained,
he was so happy to see baby Jack that he started bawling. Taking after his comedic parents, Jack
apparently wanted to stop his father from crying, so he began making silly faces to cheer him up.
Chris Pratt has faced a wave of negative scrutiny and backlash on social media over the years. For
instance, the actor was criticized for his alleged involvement in a homophobic church. Following
this scrutiny, Pratt stated in an Instagram Story that he was not anti-LGBTQ, specifying,
"I am a man who believes that everyone is entitled
to love who they want free from the judgment of their fellow man."
While Pratt is usually able to brush off criticism, there was one particular
incident where trolls led him into a depression. It all started when the
actor posted an Instagram photo of his wife, Katherine Schwarzenegger Pratt, and wrote,
"She's given me an amazing life,
a gorgeous healthy daughter [...] Her heart is pure and it belongs to me."
Critics assumed this was an insult to Pratt's former wife and his son Jack,
who faced numerous health complications from birth. Pratt responded to the
hate in an interview with Men's Health, expressing how much this hurt him, saying,
"My son's gonna read that one day. [...] it's
etched in digital stone. It really f—ing bothered me, dude. I cried about it."