Jennifer Lawrence addresses return to Hunger Games franchise - The Independent

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Jennifer Lawrence is speaking out for the first time about reprising her role of Katniss Everdeen in the upcoming Hunger Games prequel.

After months of speculation about the cast of the original film franchise making an appearance in The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping, the 36-year-old Oscar-winning actor confirmed she will wear her iconic braid again in the new film, which hits theaters November 20.

“It was unbelievable,” Lawrence told Call Her Daddy host Alex Cooper about reprising the role during Wednesday’s podcast episode. “It was so crazy. It was the same crew. It was the same AD, who I’ve worked with a million times because I love him.”

She went on to say that working with co-stars Josh Hutcherson and Woody Harrelson — who played Peeta Mellark and Haymitch Abernathy, respectively — again was “so emotional.”

“Josh and I didn’t walk to the bathroom without our arms around each other,” she said. “It was so beautiful.”

She joked: “And Woody, obviously, came through the window of my hotel room uninvited. It wouldn’t be the same if he listened to boundaries or used a door.”

Speculation about Lawrence, Hutcherson and Harrelson reprising their roles began to swirl after Suzanne Collins’ Sunrise on the Reaping novel ended with an epilogue featuring Katniss, Peeta and Haymitch.

The original four movies, adapted from Collins’ three dystopian books, grew into a multi billion-dollar global franchise, becoming one of the most commercially and culturally successful young adult adaptations of the 2010s. The films ran from 2012 to 2015, grossing over $3.3 billion worldwide.

Collins then continued the series with the prequel book The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, released in 2020, which centered around a young Coriolanus Snow, who is the main antagonist of the series as the evil president of its fictitious post-apocalyptic nation Panem.

The prequel was later adapted into a film starring Rachel Zegler as District 12 tribute Lucy Gray Baird and Tom Blyth as Snow, who was later played by the late Donald Sutherland, and will be portrayed in the new film by Ralph Fiennes. The film grossed more than $300 million in theaters.

Sunrise on the Reaping is set 40 years after The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, and centers on a young Haymitch, who is played by East of Eden star Joseph Zada, during the 50th Hunger Games. The movie features a star-studded cast including McKenna Grace, Whitney Peak, Fiennes, Glenn Close, Jesse Plemons, Maya Hawke, Kieran Culkin, Elle Fanning and Billy Porter.