Last week Lionsgate came out and officially announced what we already knew, Francis Lawrence (Water for Elephants) was going to direct Catching Fire, the sequel to The Hunger Games, which has so far brought in over $600 million worldwide.
Catching Fire suffered some highly publicized stumbling blocks in the early going with Hunger Games director Gary Ross not returning to helm the sequel, leaving the studio with a tight timeline to get the project in front of cameras and production completed by the end of the year before star Jennifer Lawrence took off to work on the X-Men: First Class sequel beginning in January. After signing Lawrence to direct all eyes turned to the script, with a first draft written by Simon Beaufoy (Oscar-winning screenwriter of Slumdog Millionaire).
Word from The Hollywood Reporter is that Lionsgate has reached out to Michael Arndt, the Oscar-winning screenwriter of Little Miss Sunshine and the Oscar-nominated screenplay for Toy Story 3, to do a polish on the script with the production still intending to get underway by late summer/early Fall for the already scheduled November 22, 2013 release.
Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, and Liam Hemsworth will reprise their roles as Katniss, Peeta and Gale, with Lenny Kravitz, Elizabeth Banks, Stanley Tucci, Donald Sutherland, Toby Jones, and Woody Harrelson also returning to their respective roles for the second film based on Suzanne Collins’ novel.
The story picks up where the first film left off as rumors of rebellion are beginning to swirl, and Katniss and Peeta are the faces of that rebellion. The Capitol is angry. The Capitol wants revenge.
