Sept. 6 (UPI) — Anna Faris says she “never” thought Chris Pratt should be her best friend during their marriage.
The 40-year-old actress discussed the importance of female friendships in an essay for the October issue of Cosmopolitan following her split from Pratt over the summer.
“I was once told that I didn’t need a tight group of girlfriends because Chris should be my best friend. But I never bought that. The idea of your mate being your best friend — it’s overhyped,” Faris wrote.
“I really believe that your partner serves one purpose and each friend serves another,” she explained. “There’s the friend you confess things to and the friend with whom you do the listening. Or this is the person I talk to when I’m feeling lonely and sad.”
Faris said she considered herself “a guys’ girl” until she realized she wasn’t getting “any fulfillment” from her relationships with male friends. She now counts her Mom co-star Allison Janney and other women among her closest pals.
“The truth of why I didn’t have girlfriends probably had nothing to do with my being a guys’ girl and everything to do with the fact that I was angry and jealous and unduly proud of the guys I was hanging out with,” the star confessed.
“It took me longer than it should have to realize just how important female relationships are,” she said. “It takes vulnerability of spirit to open yourself up to other women in a way that isn’t competitive, and that’s especially hard in Hollywood, where competition is built into almost every interaction.”
Faris and Pratt, who share 5-year-old son Jack, announced their separation in August after eight years of marriage. The actress subsequently encouraged fans on her “Anna Faris is Unqualified” podcast to embrace their independence.
“Don’t feel afraid to feel your independence if things aren’t right,” she advised a listener struggling with her boyfriend. “Know your worth, know you independence, know that you’re young, and there’s so many people out there.”
“Life is too short for you to be in relationships where you’re not feeling like this isn’t fully right or somebody doesn’t have your back or somebody doesn’t value you in every way,” the star said.
