The Hunger Games play debuts in a London theatre this year

A theatre adaptation of the movie and book series The Hunger Games is coming to London as a play later this year.

There are clearly big expectations for the show, because it will be staged in a new 1200-seater venue, tailor made for the production — the Troubadour Canary Wharf Theatre.

The Hunger Games will open on October 20th, and tickets go on sale at 1pm UK time on March 27th.

It’s going to be a pretty action-packed production, which loads of acrobatics, and actors tearing across the stage space attached to cabled supports.

What’s On Stage has posted a behind-the-scenes look at the show. It’s energetic stuff:

The play is based on Suzanne Collins's first The Hunger Games book. It's an adaptation by Conor McPherson, who came to prominence in theatre-land for this play The Weir. He has also written for movies and TV, including 2020’s Artemis Fowl.

“Conor has done a fantastic adaptation, which is quite unique from the screenplay. And Matthew’s immersive, dynamic staging gives the audience a brand-new way to experience the story,” says The Hunger Games author Suzanne Collins.

Anyone who had read the first Hunger Games book, or seen the first film recently, will appreciate what a tricky feat this stage adaptation will have been.

It’s a fairly action-packed read, not the kind of story of limited numbers of characters and scenes that feels like an obvious fit for the theatre.

“We’ve been workshopping the play for over a year with our world class creative team; carefully honing our theatrical vocabulary because we want to bring audiences something as impactful and edgy as Suzanne Collins’ novel and as passionate and exciting as the movie,” says director Matthew Dunster.

“But we are going to do it in our own way – in the theatre. We want our ‘Hunger Games’ to be uniquely, thrillingly theatrical.”

The last The Hunger Games movie released in 2023 — The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes — and was a moderate box office success despite arriving the better part of a decade on from the last film. It also lacked star Jennifer Lawrence, as it’s a prequel story that focuses on Coriolanus Snow.

We’re also just a few weeks away from another book in the series from Collins, Sunrise on the Reaping. It’s out on March 18th and is another prequel, this time surrounding The Hunger Games of Haymitch.

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