Chris Pratt Once Ate A Gut-Busting Amount Of Ribs For Parks And Recreation
There are parts of an actor's job that certainly aren't easy, such as staging love scenes or doing stunt work. One aspect of performing in film and television that is especially gross though is when the actors on set have to eat the same food over and over for the sake of footage or getting a take right. Often they're not even consuming what their character is eating, but a look-alike substance. Emilia Clarke reminisced to The Daily Mirror in 2017 about how she didn't actually chew on a horse's heart for "Game of Thrones," instead consuming "solidified jam" that "tasted like bleach and raw pasta." That scene still required 28 takes to get right.
Obviously, eating pork ribs for a television shoot sounds like a walk in the park in comparison. But now imagine eating them over and over, consuming more than you've ever had to in one sitting. This is how Chris Pratt ended up putting an absurd amount of food in his stomach during a taping for "Parks and Recreation."
Pratt ate 16 racks of ribs just to make his co-star laugh
Among the cast of the NBC sitcom "Parks and Recreation," Chris Pratt was known as the mischievous little brother on set, the one who was always trying to come up with the wildest jokes to earn attention (via Vulture). During an appearance on "Jimmy Kimmel Live!," Pratt told the host that during a scene on the show set in a dinosaur-themed restaurant, "Jurassic Fork," he noticed his character had no dialogue and he wanted his character, Andy Dwyer, to get some screen time.
Pratt vowed to consume one rack of ribs per take. This way, the camera would notice his constant chewing and eating even when he wasn't saying anything. In the end, because this sequence required 12 takes, Pratt ate twelve racks of ribs. The actor was starting to feel the after-effects of the meat but liked making his co-star, Nick Offerman, giggle after each scene: "I knew it was making Nick laugh [though] I was making myself sick," he said.
But somehow he wasn't done. The show's catering company ended up cooking the rest of the ribs for lunch. In the end, Pratt ate another four racks just to make Offerman laugh again, though he admitted that "I gave myself a food coma." Sixteen portions of ribs must have seemed worth it, however, just to hear Offerman's child-like, impish giggle.
Chris Pratt and Nick Offerman ate together a lot
While Chris Pratt famously lost his "Parks and Recreation" character's chubby body and gained muscle to play Star-Lord in "Guardians of the Galaxy," he and co-star Nick Offerman actually gained weight to respectively play Andy Dwyer and Ron Swanson. Early in the show, Pratt intentionally packed on pounds because he thought Andy was funnier when he wasn't so slim, as he admitted on Jimmy Kimmel Live! Offerman, meanwhile, told Conan O' Brien that because "Parks and Recreation" was set in Indiana, he was encouraged to stay "chunkier" to capture the regular Midwestern guy vibe. Co-creator Michael Schur even said to him, "'I like you beefy, and I'd like you to stay beefy," Offerman recalled.
The result was that Offerman and Pratt, who easily bonded over food, "enjoyed eating a lot of fatty meats together." But while Offerman had to hold back a little bit, the actor recounted how Pratt, thanks to his size and metabolism, "would just regale himself" with food while "we slowly wept with jealousy."
However, these days, Pratt is on a radically different diet thanks to his busy film career as part of the "Guardians" and "Jurassic World" franchises. The actor lamented that preparation for these movies means "you starve", and his diet has to be stricter due to his age. Hopefully, he can get to play a role that requires packing on the pounds again, sometime in the near future.