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    “Not an easy time” for Chris Pratt after Gunn firing

    By SHOOTUpdated:No Comments1801 Views
    In this June 16, 2018 file photo, Chris Pratt arrives at the MTV Movie and TV Awards at the Barker Hangar in Santa Monica, Calif. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)

    By Ryan Pearson, Entertainment Writer

    LOS ANGELES (AP) --

    Chris Pratt says "it's not an easy time" as he and the rest of the "Guardians of the Galaxy" cast look to the future of the hit superhero franchise after Disney fired writer-director James Gunn.

    Pratt told The Associated Press in an interview Tuesday that he stands behind social media posts saying he hopes Gunn can be reinstated for the next movie.

    "It's not an easy time. We all love James and he's a good friend of ours, but we also really love playing the Guardians of the Galaxy. It's a complicated situation for everybody. And you know, we just want to move forward and do what's right and be the best people we can be," Pratt told the AP.

    Gunn was fired last month as director of "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3" because of old tweets that recently emerged where he joked about subjects like pedophilia and rape. He has apologized for the tweets, which were posted from 2008 to 2011.

    Pratt spoke to the AP at a bar in Los Angeles after meeting with seven disabled athletes who are being sponsored to run in the New York Marathon by Michelob Ultra. The 39-year-old actor, a spokesman for the beer brand, said it was "shocking" to hear news of Gunn's firing during Comic-Con in San Diego.

    "I love going to Comic-Con but I ended up not doing a lot of interviews around that time just because it was so shocking. All I know is we put a lot of time, thought and effort into the statement that we released about it. And I think we all kind of want that statement to be essentially what we have to say about it. And we were pretty clear and honest about how we feel," Pratt said.

    Pratt signed an open letter released 10 days after Gunn's firing, saying the cast fully supports the director and the character he showed both on the set of the first two movies and in the wake of his firing. Zoe Saldana, Bradley Cooper, Vin Diesel and five other main stars of the franchise also signed the letter.

    Before his firing, Gunn's Twitter account was heavy on left-leaning politics, and some on the right with whom he'd sparred found and promoted the tweets that led to his ouster.

    Gunn has been writer and director of the "Guardians of the Galaxy" franchise from the start, taking an obscure Marvel Comics title about a group of misfits and turning it into a space opera decked with comedy and retro music that made Pratt a major movie star. Through two installments the franchise has brought in more than $1.5 billion in global box office.

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    Tags:Chris PrattGuardians of the GalaxyJames Gunn



    As the world rediscovers “The Odyssey,” disabled actors in Greece explore the pain of war

    Sunday, August 9, 2026
    From left to right, Eirini Kourouvani, a wheelchair dancer, Evi Saoulidou and Lydia Fotopoulou perform during a dress rehearsal of Euripides' tragedy The Trojan Women, staged by the National Theatre of Greece, at the Ancient Theater of Epidaurus, Greece, on Thursday, July 30, 2026. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)

    As Christopher Nolan's "The Odyssey" renews global fascination with Homer, a cast of disabled and non-disabled performers in Greece is staging the war's other story.

    It's not about the triumph of returning heroes, but the suffering they left behind.

    "The Trojan Women," with a cast of 22, was staged at Epidaurus, the ancient open-air stone arena in southern Greece. It marked what organizers called the first fully accessible performance in the ancient theater's 2,300-year history.

    While Homer followed warriors sailing home from Troy, the playwright Euripides — writing some three centuries later — turned to the city's ruins and its women, forced into exile and enslavement.

    The ancient theater offered a full range of accessibility services for the Aug. 2 performance. Blind audience members received Braille programs, tactile models and live audio description, while deaf spectators followed overhead titles. Physical adaptations also improved access throughout the site.

    "It's the first time a performance at Ancient Epidaurus has been made accessible to everyone," said Greg Polychronidis, a Paralympic gold medalist who attended the event. "Today was a celebration of equality and it should serve as an example for everyone, forever."

    For many of the performers, standing on the ancient stage was itself part of the message: a voice for those often overlooked. Eirini Kourouvani, a 58-year-old cast member who uses a wheelchair, had never set foot inside the theater before.

    "It is just grand," she said. "I feel my heart opening up as wide as this theater is."

    Ioanna-Maria Gertsou, a blind psychologist, attended with Babu, her guide dog.

    "We too have the right to attend performances on an equal footing," she said,... Read More

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