The latest instalment in The Hunger Games franchise, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, hasn’t even made its way into theatres yet but Lionsgate is already in the process of casting the sequels.
Today, the studio announced that they have officially cast Game of Thrones actress Natalie Dormer in both parts of The Hunger Games: Mockingjay. Dormer will play the role of Cressida, a character that joins the rebellion alongside Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence) and Gale (Liam Hemsworth). Cressida is a director from The Capitol who leaves with her camera crew – Castor and Pollux – to chronicle the uprising.
It’ll be interesting to see how Dormer gets into character considering the contrast between her recurring role as the future Queen of the seven kingdoms, Margaery Tyrell, and the hardcore, tattooed filmmaker.
Before the fourth season of Game of Thrones returns to HBO next spring, Dormer has an exciting year ahead of her with two films heading to theaters later this year – Ron Howard’s Rush in Spetember, and Ridley Scott’s The Counselor (written by Cormac McCarthy) in October.
Cressida was one of the few characters that still needed to be cast for the project as most of the new faces we’ll see in the franchise were added in The Hunger Games: Catching Fire. That being said, there are a few more we can look forward to. For one, the studio is eying Julianne Moore to play the President Alma Coin, the leader of the rebellion against The Capitol. It’s hard to go into more details without spoiling the plot, but basically President Coin will become one of the most important characters in the remaining films.
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Parts 1 and 2, based on Suzanne Collins bestselling YA franchise, will be directed by Francis Lawrence and are expected to hit theatres on November 21, 2014 and November 20, 2015.
