Rachel Zegler has addressed the topic of her potential return for the new Hunger Games movie.
The actor fronted A Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes as Lucy Gray Baird, a tribute selected to compete in one of the earliest Hunger Games, under the tutelage of a young Coriolanus Snow.
Another prequel titled Sunrise on the Reaping is on the way, set 40 years after Ballad (making it 24 years before the original The Hunger Games) and focusing on the character Haymitch Abernathy, a Hunger Games victor who eventually becomes Katniss Everdeen’s mentor.
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Due to the time gap, it seems unlikely that Lucy would return in Sunrisebut Hollywood loves a cameo, and between makeup and CGI it wouldn’t be difficult to age her up.
However, in a new interview with Cosmopolitan, Zegler outright confirmed that she won’t be back for the next film in the franchise.
“I would die at the chance to come back as Lucy Gray Baird, but I am not included,” she told the publication.
Before the film’s release in 2026, Suzanne Collins’ Sunrise on the Reaping novel will come out first, on March 18 next year.
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“With Sunrise on the ReapingI was inspired by David Hume’s idea of implicit submission and, in his words, ‘the easiness with which the many are governed by the few,” the author said.
“The story also lent itself to a deeper dive into the use of propaganda and the power of those who control the narrative. The question ‘Real or not real?’ seems more pressing to me every day.”
Sunrise on the Reapinga new Hunger Games prequel movie, will open in cinemas on November 20, 2026. The book of the same name is released on March 18, 2025 and available to pre-order now.
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Joe Anderton is a freelance news writer at Digital Spyhaving worked there since 2016. In his time, he’s covered a host of live events and interviewed celebrities big and small.
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