They have portrayed the leaders of two of Marvel’s most famous superhero teams but are Chris Pratt and Chris Evans friends in reality?
Chris Pratt and Chris Evans are friends and bonded, in part, over their mutual love of football. In 2015, the two Marvel stars had a friendly Super Bowl bet where the loser would visit a hospital in full superhero attire. Despite winning, Evans happily visited a hospital as Pratt had.
For more on Chris Pratt and Chris Evans and their super friendship, read on.
Star-Lord
Since 2014, Chris Pratt has portrayed Peter Quill, leader of the Guardians of the Galaxy, in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The casting was hotly contested, with numerous actors keen to be the face of the new franchise within Hollywood’s biggest franchise.
Pratt, having displayed his comedic chops for a number of years in “Parks and Recreation” since 2009, probably seemed an ideal choice for the role. Quill is a roguish, yet buffoonish, space adventurer who is abducted from Earth as a child and grows up in space.
Adopting the name Star-Lord, Quill ends up leading a team of alien misfits to save the galaxy, hence the group’s name. The film marked the first significant risk for Marvel, whose previous films in the MCU had been based around superheroes with existing mainstream name value.
The first film, directed by James Gunn, proved to be a huge success with its mix of comedy and space adventure.
As of writing, Pratt has appeared as Peter Quill in “Guardians of the Galaxy” and its sequel, “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2”. He also appeared in “Avengers: Infinity War” and its sequel, “Avengers: Endgame”, along with just about every hero to ever appear in a MCU movie.
Captain America
One of the key players in the MCU since its inception in the late 2000s, Chris Evans had actually already appeared in a Marvel adaptation. In 2005, he appeared in “Fantastic Four” as Johnny Storm, the “Human Torch”, and reprised the role in its sequel “Rise of the Silver Surfer”.
Both films were heavily maligned, part of a string of panned Marvel adaptations in the mid-2000s that included “Ghost Rider” and “Daredevil”. With Marvel, now owned by Disney, keen to take control of their own characters, the franchise was about to see a significant upturn in fortunes.
Beginning with “Iron Man” in 2008, Marvel began establishing their unified “Cinematic Universe”. Evans was cast as one of the company’s most iconic characters, “Captain America” Steve Rogers, and would be one of its biggest stars for the next decade.
Evans’ Cap has appeared in “Captain America: The First Avenger” and its sequels “The Winter Soldier” and “Civil War”. He has also appeared in four “Avengers” movies and had cameos in four other Marvel films.
For the time being, the character appears to be retired but as any comic fan knows, never say never.
Friendship
Pratt and Evans appear to be good friends and have bonded over, among other things, a mutual love of football. Pratt, despite being from Minnesota, began following the Seahawks after he and his wife, Anna Farris, bought a second home in Washington.
Evans, on the other hand, was born in Boston and is a lifelong Patriots fan. When the two teams faced off in Super Bowl XLIX in 2015, the two stars had a bet: whichever team lost, their respective fan would visit a hospital in the winner’s city in full superhero attire.
The Patriots won and Pratt visited Christopher’s Haven, a children’s cancer charity in Boston, as Star-Lord. Pratt, however, clearly didn’t see losing the bet as a hardship.
Similarly, Evans, who had won the bet, still donned the stars and stripes to visit Seattle Children’s Hospital in a full Captain America costume. Friendly bets aside, both actors are clearly more than happy to spend their time being charitable.