The Hunger Games: Official Illustrated Movie Companion (4 page)

Lawrence remembers reading
The Hunger Games
for the first time. “I read the books around Christmas [2010], and I went through them all in a matter of days. I just thought they were amazing. I loved the futuristic Joan of Arc character of Katniss. And it’s hard to say that something in the future is ‘true,’ but the book speaks truly about our time — it’s incredibly relevant.”

At first she wasn’t sure how she felt about seeing the books in movie form. “I was skeptical because I loved the books so much, but when I met with Gary Ross I realized within about thirty seconds that he was the only one who could make the movie and make it in the right way.”

With great confidence in Ross’s team, Lawrence read for the highly coveted lead role of Katniss. From the moment she walked into the room, her presence was magnetic. Nina Jacobson remembers, “There was instant power and intensity and certainty in Jen’s performance. She came in with this great understanding of this character. This is actually a girl whose fierceness comes from a nurturing place, not a conquering place. In her audition we used the scene in which she’s saying good-bye to her mother and her sister and Gale. There’s a line in the scene in which she tells her mother, ‘Don’t cry.’ And just in the way she tells her mom ‘Don’t cry,’ it’s kind of like ‘Don’t you dare cry. Don’t you dare fall apart in this situation.’ In that one little moment, she spoke volumes about this character and her past and her present and her future.”

Katniss runs through the arena.

Gary Ross adds, “I’ve worked with amazing actors. Someone like Jen comes by once in a generation. I mean, this is an unbelievably rare thing. This is Michael Jordan, this is Baryshnikov, this talent is almost stunning to witness. There’s nothing you can ask her to do that she can’t do.”

Lionsgate’s Joe Drake reminisces about the audition tape that landed Lawrence the unanimous support of the studio, and ultimately the role: “We always factor in a certain degree of research and analysis when we make these major casting decisions. But what ultimately led us to cast Jennifer in the role of Katniss wasn’t anything that could be calculated — it was the visceral reaction of myself and the other decision makers at Lionsgate to her audition. Jennifer’s read gave me chills, and it made me cry. At the end of the day, all of the best casting decisions are made based on raw talent and gut reactions, and we are particularly proud of this one.”

Jennifer Lawrence was in London when she heard she’d landed the part and was overjoyed and overwhelmed: “I was convinced I didn’t have it. And then I got the phone call while I was in London. I was then terrified. I knew this was going to be huge, and that was scary. I called my mom. She said, ‘This is a script that you love, and you’re thinking about not doing it because of the size of it?’ And I don’t want to not do something because I’m scared, so I said yes to the part, and I’m so happy I did.”

Jennifer Lawrence loses herself in a book while taking a break from shooting a scene in the Training Center.

Suzanne Collins had been in on the audition, and she was one of the first people to set Lawrence’s mind at ease about the role. She drove it home to Lawrence that it didn’t matter if people said she was too old or too blonde to play Katniss. “I talked to Suzanne after I got the part, when I was still in England, and it was incredible — I mean, I’m her biggest fan. She said, ‘I know you can do it,’ and all of these other nice things that just gave me the boost that I needed. Hearing them from the woman who created Katniss — I felt like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders,” Lawrence recalls.

“And then we moved on to Peeta and Gale,” says Robin Bissell, “and it was almost exactly the same thing. Josh came in and he sat down and read the cave scene, where he’s hurt and Katniss is nursing him back to life, and immediately he was Peeta. I mean, it was that clear.”

Jacobson says, “When Josh Hutcherson came in to audition, I had actually just met with him earlier in the week, and he was so comfortable in his own skin, so charming and so at ease and so likeable. I felt that he really captured that ‘Peeta-ocity’ of somebody who seemed genuinely sweet, genuinely likeable, but also that he could be a little smooth when he needed to be. You could see how he could cover the politician side of the character that Katniss is both attracted to and suspicious of.”

Suzanne Collins put it this way to
Entertainment Weekly
: “If Josh had been bright purple and had had six foot wings and gave that audition, I’d have been like, ‘Cast him! We can work around the wings!’ He was that good.”

Josh Hutcherson had been working as an actor for almost a decade already. He had appeared in classic children’s movies like
The Polar Express
and
Bridge to Terabithia
; as he grew, so did the depth of his roles. When Gary Ross and the producers were considering him, Hutcherson had recently played a key part in the acclaimed movie
The Kids Are All Right
, with Julianne Moore and Annette Bening. Starring in
The Hunger Games
, though, would change the course of his career.

Josh Hutcherson as Laser in
The Kids Are All Right
(2010).

Hutcherson says, “I fell in love with Peeta right away. His self-deprecating humor, his outlook on life, and how he doesn’t want things to change him — those things are really a part of who I am as a person. I’ve been in this business since I was nine years old and that can change you. Staying true to who I am, and what my value system is, has been important to me since I was really young.”

There was an immediate rapport between Lawrence and Hutcherson, according to many people involved in the casting. Jon Kilik says, “Jennifer and Josh have gotten along great from the beginning, right when they met in rehearsals and even in the casting process. There was a real connection there. They’re both from Kentucky, very close to where District Twelve is supposed to be. So there was this common bond, and it just grew from there.”

The final part of the pivotal trio was put in place with the casting of Australian actor Liam Hemsworth as Gale. Hemsworth had recently drawn attention as the love interest of Miley Cyrus in
The Last Song
. He wouldn’t have a great deal of screen time in
The Hunger Games
, but Ross and the producers were already looking ahead to future movies, where Gale would step into the spotlight.

Katniss and Gale relax in the woods outside District 12.

Jacobson puts it this way: “Liam is this big, hunky guy. He has a clear physical advantage over Peeta, which we found interesting — that they would be physically contrasting types. And when we put the actors together in the auditions, you could see how, when Katniss asks Gale to take care of her family, she would trust that he’d do it. Liam is able to communicate very effectively with his eyes and with the small gestures. But you also believe that he has that revolutionary spirit, that he has that fiery quality inside of him.”