The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes Cast & Characters Infographics - A Visual Guide

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With all the casting news coming out for The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, it’s getting tough to keep track of who’s who among all the new faces - especially with the sheer number of characters in the film, and the fanciful (yet always meaningful) names Suzanne Collins uses in the book. We thought it was time for a visual guide to the characters and cast!

*There are light spoilers here for those of you who haven’t read the book.*

Mentors & Tributes 

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The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is set around the 10th Hunger Games, and was the first Hunger Games to introduce mentors for the tributes, recruiting 24 of the Capitol Academy's best and brightest seniors for the task. 

We‘ve laid out the tribute and mentor pairs to help you familiarize yourselves with who has been cast. You’ll find the Capitol mentors up top paired with their tributes from the corresponding districts below. We’ve left out tributes and mentors that haven’t been officially announced yet, so you’ll see there are some districts missing. It seems like some of the mentors and tributes that have a, shall we say, “limited” amount of time in the story will be treated more as featured extras and won't be part of an official casting announcement. 

The Covey and District 12

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Next up is the visual guide for The Covey and District 12. We’ve got the full cast for The Covey and it’s really fun to see them all together. There are so many new faces and I think they made awesome choices. I can totally imagine them playing music at The Hob.  

For background, The Covey were a group of traveling musical performers in Panem whose name means family or small flock of birds.They made their money by performing at places like The Hob. After the war, they were rounded up and forced to settle in District 12.

 

A Covey member's first name was taken from a ballad, their middle name from a color, and their last name was a family name. The one exception was Lucy Gray Baird, whose first and middle name both came from the same ballad. The three Baird girls are cousins, Clerk Carmine Clade and Billy Taupe Clade are brothers and Tam Amber is, according to Maude Ivory, “a lost soul.”

The Covey consists of 5 members:

Lucy Gray Baird (vocals, guitar) played by Rachel Zegler

Maude Ivory Baird (vocals, percussion) played by Vaughan Reilly

Barb Azure Baird (bass) played by Honor Gillies

Tam Amber (mandolin) played by Eike Onyambu

Clerk Carmine Clade (fiddle) played by Konstantin Taffet​​​​​​​

plus one ex member, Billy Taupe Clade played by Dakota Shapiro. 

The District 12 of The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is similar to the place you know from The Hunger Games series - it’s a poor district, coal mining is the main industry, and there’s a brewing rebellion. There’s also a Peacekeeper base where new recruits are trained. 

District 12 book characters are: 

Mayor Lipp

Mayfair Lipp (Mayor Lipps's daughter) played by Isobel Jesper Jones

Rebels in D12:

Spruce played by George Somner

Arlo Chance played by Raphael Zari

Lil  

Peacekeepers in D12:

Commander Hoff played by Burn Gorman

Smiley played by Carl Spencer

Beanpole aka Junius played by Scott Folan

Bug

Cookie 

District 12 Peacekeepers and citizens not yet officially cast are Bug, (Snow’s bunk mate) Arlo, Lil, Cookie, and Mayor Lipp. We know Arlo and Lil are definitely a part of the production. The Hanging Tree story line and song are important parts of the book and the larger Hunger Games lore, and there were fans on site for the filming of the hanging tree scenes in Germany who saw an actor or stunt person get “hanged” over and over for hours.

The Capitol

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The Capitol we experience in The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is 10 years after the first rebellion, a civil war between the Capitol and the districts. The effects of the war were still felt in the Capitol - rubble lay in piles on the sidewalks, whole buildings were still gutted, food was scarce for The Snow family and the black market was alive and well. 

The Academy was “the finest secondary school in the Capitol” educating the offspring of the prominent, wealthy and influential. Coriolanus and Tigris were able to attend due to their family’s long history at the school and prominent family name. 

The Citadel was an imposing structure which housed the Capitol's War Department. Dr. Volumnia Gaul, Head Gamemaker of the 10th Hunger Games and head of Citadel experimental weapons division, was based here. She had laboratories underground, where she bred various muttations, including snakes and rabbits.

The Capitol characters in the book consist of:

Snow Family

Coriolanus Snow played by Tom Blyth

Tigris Snow (his cousin) played by Hunter Schafer

The Grandma'am (their grandmother) played by Fionnula Flanagan

Crassus Snow (Coriolanus' father) 

Mrs. Snow (Coriolanus' mother)

Plinth Family

Sejanus Plinth (one of Coriolanus Snow’s classmates, close friends, and a reluctant mentor along side him in the Games) played by Josh Andrés Rivera. 

Strabo Plinth (Sejanus’ father, a munitions magnate from District 2 who bought his way into the Capitol) played by Michael Greco

Ma Plinth (Sejanus’ mother) played by Daniela Grubert

The Academy & The Citadel

Dr. Volumina Gaul (Head Gamemaker, instructor, head of Citadel experimental weapons division) played by Viola Davis

Dean Casca Highbottom (Dean of The Academy) played by Peter Dinklage

President Ravinstill (President Of Panem, great uncle to Felix Ravinstill, mentor)

Dr. Kay (assistant scientist in Gaul's lab)

Prof Satyria Click (Academy instructor and a mentor of Coriolanus Snow)

Prof Agrippa Sickle (Academy instructor of physical education)

Crispus Demigloss (a history professor at the Academy)

Dr. Wane (a doctor who took care of Coriolanus Snow and Clemensia Dovecote)

The Games

Lucretius “Lucky” Flickerman (Hunger Games Master of Ceremonies) played by Jason Schwartzman

Lepidus Malmsey (Capitol News reporter)

Capitol Citizens

Pluribus Bell (an old Snow family friend who runs the black market) - Producer Nina Jacobson confirmed on twitter that this character will not be in the film. 

Fabricia Whatnot (fashion designer in The Capitol, as well as Tigris's boss)

Nero Price (a neighbor of the Snows, father of Persephone Price, mentor)

Remus Dolittle (Gamemaker-in-training and a downstairs neighbor of the Snow family)

As you can see, there are quite a few minor Capitol characters yet to be officially cast. With such a character dense book, I’m sure some of the smaller characters had to be cut from the adaptation. 

We hope this helps to familiarize you with this huge cast!

  

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes debuts in theaters on Nov. 17, 2023.

Peter Dinklage Joins 'The Hunger Games: The Ballad Of Songbirds & Snakes’ As Dean Highbottom

Peter Dinklage joins the growing cast of The Hunger Games: The Ballad Of Songbirds & Snakes as Casca Highbottom, dean of The Academy and young Coriolanus Snows’ nemesis. 

“Dean Highbottom is one of the most powerful people in Snow’s life. As the austere and vindictive face of the games, he sets the rules that will determine every aspect of Coriolanus’s fate. I’m thrilled that Peter will be bringing him to life,” said director Francis Lawrence speaking to Deadline.

Producer Nina Jacobsen added, “I cannot think of an actor more perfectly suited to inhabit the role of Highbottom,” Jacobson said. “As the man credited with conceiving the Hunger Games and the Dean of the Academy,  Casca Highbottom is a character with secrets.  Peter’s magnetism, intensity and dark humor will infuse him with the intelligence, depth and pathos that the role demands.” Amen! 

Nathan Kahane, President of Lionsgate’s Motion Picture Group weighed in, “With production underway, we couldn’t be more excited about the way this cast has come together and thrilled to be welcoming Peter Dinklage to Panem. Peter is not just a fan favorite actor who brings a commanding presence to every part he plays. He is one of the best actors alive. He will bring a formidable, charismatic authority to the important role of the dean of the Academy.”

Dean Highbottom is a complicated character in the book and a lot more interesting than he initially appears. We can’t wait to see what Dinklage brings to the character. 

Maude Ivory, Billy Taupe, More Tributes & Mentors Join The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes!

The latest round of tributes, mentors and Covey members cast in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes includes Irene Boehm, Cooper Dillon, Luna Kuse, Kjell Brutscheidt, Dimitri Abold, Athena Strates, Dakota Shapiro, George Somner and Vaughan Reilly.

Boehm will play Lamina, a tribute from District 7; Dillon will play Mizzen, tribute from District 4; Kuse will play Brandy, tribute from District 10; Brutscheidt will play Tanner, tribute from District 10; Abold will play Reaper, tribute from District 11; Strates will play Persephone Price, mentor to District 4’s Mizzen; Shapiro will play Billy Taupe, rebel, troublemaker, and Lucy Gray Bairds complicated ex from the Covey; Somner will play Spruce, a rebel from District 12; and Reilly will play Maude Ivory, the youngest member of the Covey.

First Look at Tom Blyth As A Blonde!

Tom Blyth shared this pic today in Instagam stories - presumably getting into character for his role as young Coriolanus Snow in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes! The reaction on social media was mostly "please get this man some toner" (still traumatized from Josh Hutcherson's eyebrows in The Hunger Games, perhaps?) but I have to admit I can really start to see the transformation happening. Going blonde is HARD, people. He's going to be amazing. 

'The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes' Adds More Mentors & Tributes!

The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes keeps expanding its ensemble cast with another round of actors announced as mentors and one tribute. 

Ayomide Adegun has been cast as Pliny “Pup” Harrington. Pup mentors Lamina, District 7’s female tribute. Max Raphael plays Festus Creed Mentor of District 4’s Coral. Kaitlyn Akinpelumi has been cast as Domitia Whimsiwick who mentors Tanner - the male tribute from District 10. Amélie Hoeferle will play Vipsania Sickle, the mentor of the District 7 male tribute, Treech. Zoë Renee will play Lysistrata Vickers who mentors Jessup, District 12’s male tribute. Sofia Sanchez has been cast as Wovey the District 8 female tribute mentored by Hilarius Heavensbee.

The film arrives in theaters November 17, 2023.