Rachel Zegler Originally Turned Down 'The Hunger Games' Prequel - Find Out Why!

Rachel Zegler is opening up about her audition, or lack thereof, for the upcoming The Hunger Games prequel movie, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes!

The 21-year-old actress reveals that she was offered the role in January 2022, but actually turned down the leading role of Lucy Gray Baird, at first.

Find out the reason why inside…

“Let me tell you, because this is such an embarrassing story for me,” she told Josh Horowitz on the Happy Sad Confused podcast. “I was offered it in January of last year, after wanting it so badly. I didn’t audition, it was just, I got a call from my agent that was like, ‘Francis Lawrence wants you to do this,’ and I met with him for like three hours at the Soho Hotel in London, and then he told me that they were filming in Germany and in Poland.”

“I had just gotten to London and I wanted to disappear, because I was so far away from home for the first time ever and I was away from everybody that I knew and loved. And I said, ‘No,’” she continued. “I regretted it the second I said it. I had another project lined up that fell through, that got pushed into 2023, and I just kind of put my name back into the mix and got it.”

“I feel really bad for any of the girls who [were auditioning],” she added. “Because I put my name back in and they were just like, ‘Yup, okay, cool, we’ll do it.’”

“It’s true and Francis is still made at me,” she added on Instagram story.

Rachel‘s casting was officially confirmed in May 2022, and they wrapped filming months later in November.