The cast of Sunrise on the Reaping also includes Mckenna Grace, Jesse Plemons, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Maya Hawke, Lili Taylor and more
On Friday, May 16, Lionsgate announced that Fienes, 62, will star in the upcoming adaptation of author Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping as President Coriolanus Snow, the main antagonist of the franchise.
Fiennes takes over the role from the late Donald Sutherland, who played the character in Jennifer Lawrence's four original Hunger Games movies. Tom Blyth portrayed a young version of the character in 2023's The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, which served as an origin story for Snow.
"We wanted to honor Donald Sutherland by having one of this generation's greatest actors play President Snow 24 years before Katniss Everdeen entered the arena," the movie's producer Nina Jacobson said in a statement May 16.
"Working with Ralph has been on my bucket list since he traumatized me for life in Schindler's List. It's genuinely a thrill to welcome him to the Hunger Games," added Jacobson.
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Sutherland died at 88 in June 2024 after a long illness. The late actor brought a calm and sinister tone to his performances as President Snow. Blyth's turn in the role saw the character rise to power within Panem as a mentor in an early version of the Hunger Games.
Fiennes has been nominated for three Academy Awards in his film career, most recently for his performance as a Catholic cardinal in 2024's Conclave.
The actor first established himself as a formidable on-screen antagonist when he portrayed Nazi war criminal Amon Göth in Steven Spielberg's 1993 drama Schindler's List; he received Oscar nominations for that and for The English Patient.
He played Voldemort, the villain of the Harry Potter franchise, in five movies released between 2005 and 2011.
Fiennes joins a Sunrise on the Reaping cast that already includes Joseph Zada, Whitney Peak, Mckenna Grace, Jesse Plemons, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Maya Hawke, Lili Taylor and Ben Wang.
It follows a young version of Woody Harrelson's character Haymitch Abernathy during his own journey through the Hunger Games two decades before the main series.