Chris Pratt

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Chris Pratt admits he wasn’t very smart with his first big paycheck after breaking into Hollywood.

During an appearance on SiriusXM’s Sway in the Morning, the actor opened up about his “made it” moment as well as learning about the importance of financial literacy later in life.

When Pratt was asked if he was frugal with the money he initially earned from acting because of his modest beginnings, he quickly responded, “No!”

“I was under the impression that I would never run out of money,” the Guardians of the Galaxy star explained with a laugh. “The first paycheck I got, I was like, ‘Are you serious?’ I had lived on very little money for a long time, so the first big job I got … was a TV movie. I got paid $75,000.”

He went on to sing his own rendition of George Michael’s “Careless Whisper”: “I was like, ‘I’m never gonna wait again. Fuck you, bitches, I am leaving,’” Pratt quipped. “And then about two months later, I was like, ‘Where’d that money go?!’”

Pratt said he traveled back to Hawaii, Australia and really “the world,” thinking he wouldn’t run out of money. “I was like, ‘Well, I’m gonna probably invest, I’m probably gonna get a yacht,’” he added. “That was just a crazy amount of money to me. I never could have possibly imagined making that amount of money and it went very quickly.”

The Jurassic World actor explained that he was never taught about financial literacy when he was younger because “we never had any money growing up.” But as life got more expensive as an adult, he realized he needed to create a plan.

“I didn’t know what to do with money. It was like, it would come in, I would spend it,” Pratt said. “It took a good amount of time for me to kind of stop and say, ‘All right, I gotta get wise about this.’ I have to think about, ‘What am I gonna do? How am I gonna get to the point where if I stop working one day, I’ll still be OK? My family will be OK.’ So, kind of coming up with a financial literacy plan, you know, later in my life was sort of one of the steps of me growing up.”

The Parks and Recreation actor also said there were many moments throughout his career when he felt like he “made it,” including a Carl’s Jr. TV commercial, getting his SAG card and finding a talent rep. However, his most memorable moment was buying his mother, Kathy Pratt, a house after his role on the TV drama Everwood.