Why Anna Faris feels ‘lucky’ to have her son despite Hollywood upbringing
Anna Faris is one proud — and lucky — mother.
The 48-year-old “Scary Movie” actress, who shares a 12-year-old son, Jack, with ex-husband Chris Pratt, was quick to praise her only biological child during an interview with People, published March 20.
“I feel so lucky,” Faris told the outlet.
“He’s always had such a solid anchor. I don’t know where, being a kid in Hollywood, he got that,” she continued. “I don’t know how he got so down-to-earth, but I’m really grateful.”
However, while Faris is beyond proud to be Jack’s mom, she explained in a 2019 interview with PopCulture that Jack knows how to be a typical kid.
During that interview, Faris dished on one of the grossest mom moments she experienced in Jack’s younger years.
“The other day, Jack called me into the bathroom, and he was showing me how he could pee all over the place,” Faris said in 2019.
“He could hit different targets, which was amusing for him,” she recalled with a laugh. “I think he even said, ‘Look, it’s almost like a science project.’”
“What’s tricky is that I think it’s very difficult for a mom or a parent to be (stern) because the kids know that they can push back,” she explained, per PopCulture.
That was never an issue for Jack at school, Faris said, but his attitude would change at home.
“When he gets home, he’s like, ‘No, I don’t want to’ or ‘What are you going to give me?’” she said of giving him chores.
“And it’s like, ‘OK, here’s this $2 bill if you make your bed or whatever.’ It’s the negotiating that they learn so quickly,” she added.
Fast forward five years and Faris is still trying to find a balance between being a fun, yet stern, mom.
“It’s true that, for better or for worse, I think I am a mom who really likes to have fun,” she said in a 2024 interview with People. “I do love to laugh with Jack, and that makes me feel youthful.”
One of the ways she keeps their mother-son relationship strong is with a simple biannual tradition.
“Every six months he gets to choose an activity,” she told the outlet. “We haven’t conquered Universal Studios yet. But going up to the San Diego Zoo, that kind of thing. And I love those mother-son trips.”
She also admitted to playing “imaginary games” with Jack — as well as other people in her life.
“And we’ll play-act games together. I’ll be a mean nanny, or I love to do boarding-school headmistress,” she added.
“I love playing those kinds of imaginary games with people in my life, which annoys some of them but doesn’t seem to annoy Jack too much yet,” she continued.
Faris and Pratt welcomed Jack in August 2012, three years after the couple tied the knot in Bali, Indonesia. The couple announced their divorce in 2017, but have remained close as co-parents.
Faris has since moved on with cinematographer Michael Barrett, whom she married in 2021, and is a stepmom to his two older children, while Pratt tied the knot with Katherine Schwarzenegger in 2019.
Pratt and Schwarzenegger have since welcomed three more children to the blended family.
“Under all of these uncoupling circumstances, I think that we are so good and respectful toward each other,” Faris said of her co-parenting relationship with Pratt on the “Divorce Sucks!” podcast in 2019.
“Grudge-holding is not something that Chris and I do. So, we wanted to make sure, of course, that Jack was happy,” she added.
