Francis Lawrence Explains Why Cooper Hoffman Wasn’t Cast in Sunrise on the Reaping

Francis Lawrence addressed why he didn’t cast Cooper Hoffman as Plutarch Heavensbee in The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping. Lawrence said he loved the chance to work with Cooper again, but casting required a different on-screen age dynamic: “We needed someone who felt considerably older than Cooper is.” Plutarch appears in the prequel as a younger version than in the earlier films, which Philip Seymour Hoffman portrayed. Jesse Plemons ultimately took the role.