The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes Director Francis Lawrence Talks the Franchise’s Future

The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes is heading to theaters this month, and it’s based on Suzanne Collins’ book of the same name. Every film from the series has been adapted from her stories, which has some fans wondering if she plans to write more. The new film follows 18-year-old Coriolanus Snow (Tom Blyth) before he becomes the tyrannical president of Panem, which means the story takes place 64 years before The Hunger Games. ComicBook.com recently had the chance to interview Francis Lawrence who directed the upcoming film in addition to Catching Fire, Mockingjay – Part 1, and Mockingjay – Part 2. We asked if there are any more stories from The Hunger Games universe he’d like to see brought to life. 

“I don’t know,” Lawrence began. “I think what I’ve always been interested in is the way that Suzanne writes from a thematic foundation. The original series is about consequence of war, many facets of those themes. This really is about the sort of ‘state of nature’ debate. And so I think if she were to come up with something else, I’m less interested in where it takes place within the world of Panem and even who the characters are, as long as it has that thematic foundation. And I know if Suzanne does it, it’ll have it.” 

During our chat with Lawrence, the director also talked about adapting the longest book in Collins’ best-selling franchise. 

“I don’t think it was really anything that we fought to keep in,” Lawrence shared. “I think the trick was figuring out how to keep as much of the information in the story as possible, but we had to compress it because this is the longest book in the series. And so making sure that we can get it down to a feature-length, that was just the tricky part.” 

You can watch our interview with Lawrence at the top of the page.

Who Stars In The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes? 

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes stars Tom Blyth as Coriolanus Snow, Rachel Zegler as Lucy Gray Baird, Viola Davis as Head Gamemaker Volumnia Gaul, Peter Dinklage as Casca Highbottom, Jason Schwartzman as Lucretius “Lucky” Flickerman, Hunter Schafer as Tigris Snow, and Josh Andrés Rivera as Sejanus Plinth.  

The movie will also include Fionnula Flanagan as Grandma’am, young Coriolanus Snow’s grandmother. Isobel Jesper Jones is playing Mayfair Lipp, the daughter of the mayor of District 12. Honor Gillies will be making her professional acting debut as Barb Azure. Eike Onyambu has been cast as Tam Amber, Konstantin Taffet will be playing Clerk Carmine, Burn Gorman is Commander Hoff, Scott Folan is Beanpole, Carl Spencer is Smiley, and Michael Greco and Daniela Grubert have been cast as Strabo Plinth and Mrs. Plinth, the wealthy parents to Sejanus Plinth, Coriolanus’s best friend. Nick Benson, Laurel Marsden, Lilly Cooper, Luna Steeples, and Hiroki Berrecboth are also a part of the cast. 

The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is set to open in theaters on November 17th.