When The Hunger Games’ first ever stage show was announced, I was desperate for tickets. Now having watched the performance unfold, one detail completely threw me off
Last month The Hunger Games: On Stage made its first debut, with football legend Jamie Carragher ’s daughter, Mia Carragher, playing the face of the rebellion, Katniss Everdeen, and Hollywood icon John Malkovich playing the formidable President Snow.
The stage show follows the story of the first book in the Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins. The book follows Katniss, a young girl living in a dystopian world who volunteers to replace her sister in a tournament that ends only when one participant remains.
The Blockbuster film adaptation starred Jennifer Lawrence, catapulting her to Oscar-level stardom, former child star Josh Hutcherson, Woody Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks, Donald Sutherland and Liam Hemsworth to name a few. Five books, five films, 34 award wins and 49 nominations later, fans of the series have been waiting on edge for something new.
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A second prequel book following Woody Harrelson’s character Haymitch Abernathy and a film are expected for 2026, meaning the Hunger Games on Stage has come just at the right time to keep fans excited for more.
The show opened with some trouble and many were left disappointed by a laundry list of issues – including lengthy delays. Footage shared on TikTok showed audience members queuing outside the theatre at 7:29pm, a minute before the show was due to start, with some claiming it eventually started an hour late.
Others complained that due to the three-hour run time and interval, this meant they didn’t leave the venue until 11:45pm.
Disability influencer Sophie-Jayne Butler claimed she left the theatre before the show started and claimed a refund on her ticket because her seat in the venue “wasn’t accessible”.
But as one of those eager fans who was thrilled when I got tickets to see the show for my birthday, I put the issues aside and went to see the show for myself.
Nestled in Canary Wharf, the show takes place in the newly built £26m Troubadour theatre, purposely built for the show. With arena-style seating, audiences are seated in different “districts”, I sat high up in ‘District 11’ seats with an ideal view from above of the show.
You immediately feel like one of the capitol citizens watching the story unfold thanks to the amphitheatre design. We were introduced to District 12, Katniss, her family, Gale and Peeta.
In never before seen stage designs and the use of visual effects, we were transported in minutes to the Capitol and again into the arena, where the Hunger Games takes place.
Mia Carragher perfectly embodied Katniss’ pure determination to simply survive and offered a child-like perspective into the role that stayed true to the books’ representation of a young teenager thrown into the world of anarchy by accident.
I’ve still not wrapped my head around how they made her bow shoot arrows, but it looked so lifelike that I’m happy to let the wonder continue a little longer before I work it out.
The only downside of the show was the missing John Malkovich. Well he’s there, but only on big screens, like this omnipotent figure watching over the citizens of Panem.
In a sense, it works, giving President Snow’s omniscience in the totalitarian dictatorship, but having seen him in pretty much every advert for the show, I was hoping he’d make an appearance on stage, perhaps at the end of the show like the Wizard coming out from behind the curtains.
But with a stage that literally opens and closes, with some district seats moving to open up the stage into a rectangular shape and closing again at different points, and performances that take place all over the theatre – like a fight sequence takes place the side boards that separated the District 11 audience from stage – as well as technical wizardry to portray Katniss’ archery prowess and a story we know and love, it hard not to enjoy the Hunger Games on Stage.
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Source: Mirror
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