Rising Star Molly McCann On Finding Her Place In Panem For ‘The Hunger Games: Sunrise On The Reaping’

Molly McCann has a lot to be excited about. The 15-year-old Irish actress has already built up a roster of credits including Bad Sisters and 2020 Sundance hit title Herself, but now she’s gearing up for her biggest project to date with The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping, Lionsgate’s latest return to Suzanne Collins’ hugely popular dystopian universe.

McCann plays Louella McCoy, one of the female tributes from District 12 and a close ally of Haymitch, in a story set some 24 years before Katniss Everdeen’s story, the character famously played by Jennifer Lawrence more than a decade ago.

“The hardest part for me was having to keep it a secret for a month,” McCann tells Deadline via Zoom from her family home in Dublin. “I just wanted to tell everyone.”

Sunrise on the Reaping, which bows worldwide on November 20, opens on the morning of the reaping of the 50th Hunger Games, when the Capitol demands twice the number of tributes – 48 children instead of 24. The story focuses on 16-year-old Haymitch, played by Joseph Zada, a clever and resourceful boy from District 12. (Woody Harrelson played an older Haymitch in the previous films.) Louella, who comes from the same district, and Haymitch are particularly close as they navigate their calling to the Hunger Games.

“Haymitch and Louella have such a special bond together and I think that Joe and I did a good job of recreating that and using the book to help us capture how close they were on screen,” she says.

The film boasts a stellar cast that also includes Mckenna Grace, Elle Fanning, Maya Hawke, Ralph Fiennes, Jesse Plemons and Glenn Close. Jennifer Lawrence and Josh Hutcherson, who played Peeta in the previous films, are also expected to return in a scene where an older Haymitch recounts his Hunger Game to them.

In the book’s epilogue, an older Haymitch notes that a young Katniss reminded him of Louella not only because of the two braids in her hair but also because of her “tough and smart” demeanor. “He calls them both sweetheart and says they look alike,” she says, adding that many of her friends kept asking her if she was playing a younger Katniss. “I was like, ‘not quite, no.’ They got so confused.”

And while McCann’s didn’t cross paths with Lawrence on set, she’s hopeful the star will enjoy her performance. “I think it’s really special that I get to share something like this with someone as incredible as Jennifer Lawrence,” she says.

McCann has been exposed to the acting world all her life. Her parents are both actors and her mother runs a stage school. This upbringing, she says, means she’s been comfortable on set from a very young age.

At the age of five, she was cast as one of the child actors in 2018 drama Rosie with Bad Sisters star Sarah Greene. A few years later McCann earned an Irish Film and Television (IFTA) nomination for Best Actress in a Supporting Role in Herself, which starred Claire Dunne and Harriet Walter. That Phyllida Lloyd-directed drama saw McCann play the daughter of a single mother (Dunne) who, after escaping an abusive partner, aims to rebuild her life in a unique manner.

Working with Lloyd, she says, was a formative experience. “She was such an amazing director and Harriet Walter is a legend. It was a great learning curve for me.”

McCann auditioned for Sunrise on the Reaping in early 2025, having only watched the original Hunger Games movies a few months earlier and she admits that she was unaware of how “massive” the fanbase is. “I think I would have been very nervous if I had known how big it is,” she says.

Sunrise on the Reaping brought a lot of firsts for McCann, including shooting in a studio – the film shot at Germany’s Studio Babelsberg – and dying her hair. “I didn’t realize that when you dye your hair, you see yourself so differently,” she says. “I just thought it was the coolest thing ever.”

Director Francis Lawrence became, she says, an important creative ally during the shoot and she praises his collaborative approach and willingness to discuss scenes with the young cast. “He was always open for discussion, which made it great to know I could talk through things with him,” she says. “It really gave a sense of security while doing the scenes.”

The biggest challenge for McKenna while filming were the reaping scenes. McCann says she studied the previous films to note expressions on the faces of Katniss (Lawrence) and Prim (Willow Shields) when they were called to participate in the Games.

“It was challenging to get the look down that was scared but also controlled because you didn’t want the Capitol to see you scared at any point because you didn’t want to look weak to them,” she says. “Francis would always tell me to use my eyes and put it all through my eyes and keep it really contained while I acted. I found that was one of the most challenging things because I wanted to get it so right and for it to come across exactly how it did in the old movies. I wanted to carry that on and keep it looking correct.”

Up next, McCann can be seen in The Butler, an action comedy with Tom Hollander and Jean Reno from director Tom Edmunds, which she shot before Hunger Games. The film sees Reno plays a former WWI commando turned butler whose peaceful life is upended by mobsters collecting an old debt. McCann plays Harriett, a girl being looked after by him. While she admits she can’t reveal much yet, she says “it’s quite Christmassy with lots of action-packed moments.”

As for next steps, McCann says she’d love to do a musical one day. “If someone ever did a musical movie version of Beetlejuice, I would just love to be Lydia. I love Beetlejuice. I think it’s fantastic.”