The newest addition to the cast of Lionsgate’s The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is Viola Davis (The Woman King). Viola Davis will portray another antagonistic role as Volumnia Gaul, the Head Gamemaker of the tenth annual Hunger Games, alongside Rachel Zegler’s character Lucy Gray Baird.
Davis earned her first Academy Award in 2017 for her portrayal alongside Denzel Washington in his film Fences. She was nominated again in 2021 for George C. Wolfe’s Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, having already received nominations for The Help and Doubt. She will next be featured in Sony’s historical epic The Woman King, directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood and produced by herself.
The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, which is based on Suzanne Collins’ 2020 prequel novel, starts 64 years before the events of the Hunger Games trilogy, on the morning of the reaping of the Tenth Hunger Games, and Coriolanus Snow, who was 18 at the time, is given the responsibility of mentoring the tribute girl from the impoverished District 12.
The script by Michael Lesslie, which was based on a draft by Collins and Michael Arndt, will be directed by Francis Lawrence, who also served as director of the Hunger Games movies. Francis Lawrence, Nina Jacobson, and their producing partner Brad Simpson will serve as the franchise’s producers. Jim Miller, Tim Palen, and Suzanne Collins are executive producers. The studio is run by Scott O’Brien and Meredith Wieck.
The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is set to come out on November 17, 2023.
