Author Archives: Arianna

Did the Hunger Games mean a change in the roles you’ve been offered?

I didn’t really have any career expectations. I know that seems weird, but I’ve always been incredibly lucky, in that, the one script I read, that I fall in love with and I’m like, ‘I have to make this movie!’ or ‘I have to work with this director!’ — I’ve done it.

So that was such a rare, incredibly lucky thing that’s happened to me, that I wasn’t pining after these imaginary roles that I thought Hunger Games would satisfy. It was actually the opposite — I was afraid this one character would overpower the rest of my characters. But I genuinely liked the books and the movie and that character, and I wouldn’t be embarrassed to be known as that character for the rest of my life. Well, obviously, not only that character.

MTV: You made “House” before Jennifer landed “Hunger Games.” What was your experience like working with her? You already said you had this sense that big things were coming her way.

Tonderai: The truth is, I knew that from seeing “Winter’s Bone.” I saw that in London on a cold day and I remember thinking, “That’s the one that I want [for 'House'].” You need a really fantastic actress to get across these huge ideas. I knew she was special. And I knew it when we auditioned her. It was probably the last audition that she’s ever done. [Laughs] She came in and read for me, and just the way she read the words … actors don’t always have time to read the whole screenplay, they just read the sides. And I remember thinking, “Jesus, she’s just read this, right off the page, and it’s going right through me.” I said to her that she can be as good as she wants to be. In my mind, she can be this generation’s Meryl Streep. I seriously think she’s that good. She’s an incredible actress.

But for me, if I’m honest, all of that can be kind of irrelevant, in my book. You can have all of that talent but be a sh–person. In our industry, we attract sh–people. And she’s not. She has this real gratitude about doing what she does. She’s from a working class family and she knows there are people out there who work hard jobs. There are people sweeping the streets, nurses, people doing these really important jobs. She knows how lucky we are. I always gel with people like that. It’s an honor doing what we do. It’s a real privilege, it really is. Every day, we should be thanking the movie gods that we can do what we do. And she does that. You can sense that. She’s incredibly polite to everybody, it doesn’t matter who they are. I think she’s going to be huge. Well, she already is, but I think she’s going to get even bigger.