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Google PlayIn a new interview with Men’s Health, Chris Pratt opened up about the backlash he received last fall after people accused him of dissing his previous wife Anna Faris and their son, who was born with health issues.
Back in November, Pratt took to Instagram to share a birthday tribute to his wife, Katherine Schwarzenegger. The couple welcomed their first child together, a daughter named Lyla, in August 2020. In the post, the actor thanked Katherine for giving him “a gorgeous healthy daughter.”
Some observers considered this an indirect insult toward his and Faris’ son Jack, who was born premature and has suffered health complications as a result. (In her memoir, the Scary Movie actress recalled a doctor informing them newborn jack had “severe brain bleeding and there was a chance that he could be developmentally disabled.”)
“I said something like, ‘Find someone who looks at you the way my wife looks at me,’” Pratt recalled. “And then I gave her some shit in the thing and said, ‘But I love you. I’m so thankful for my wife—she gave me a beautiful, healthy daughter.’ And then a bunch of articles came out and said, ‘That’s so cringeworthy. I can’t believe Chris Pratt would thank her for a healthy daughter when his first child was born premature. That’s such a dig at his ex-wife.’”
Pratt continued, “And I’m like, That is fucked up. My son’s gonna read that one day. He’s nine. And it’s etched in digital stone. It really fucking bothered me, dude. I cried about it. I was like, I hate that these blessings in my life are—to the people close to me—a real burden.”
The Jurassic World went on to say that, while he knows how to confront backlash that originates on social media, it’s “not a lesson that my son has learned yet.”
Granted, prior to the aforementioned post about his “healthy daughter,” Pratt had previously acknowledged his son’s health issues, most notably in 2014 at a March of Dimes Celebration of Babies.
“I made promises in that moment about what kind of dad I wanted to be and I just prayed that he’d live long enough that I could keep them,” Pratt said. “Our Jack went from a small, helpless little squirt to a strong, smart, happy, funny, beautiful boy who loves monster trucks and Daniel Tiger, and, believe it or not, loves vegetables. Broccoli and cherry tomatoes are his favorite foods.”
