Hunger Games star Elizabeth Banks, talks about taking on the role of Effie Trinket, why she loves the book, Woody Harrelson, Rosalind Russell and much more.
Also read how Jennifer Lawrence compared The Hunger Games to The Kardashians.
Did she read The Hunger Games book before getting the script?
“Yes. I was a very early adopter. It was so epic in scope, and had such a fantastic heroine at the heart of it, that it felt to me, especially as a woman, that I had found my Lord of the Rings.”
On her biggest challenge playing Effie…
“It was very important that Effie be very three-dimensional. She can be dismissed as a buffoon or a clown. She absolutely is those things, but I wanted to make sure that you understand that she is the representative of the Capital and all that the Capital stands for. And the Capital is a dark place. She drank the Kool-Aid.”
Effie’s look is really over-the-top. How did it evolve?
“The director, Gary Ross, said, ‘I have this image that she’s Joel Grey in Cabaret.’ So that’s where we got the super-white skin. She is someone striving for perfection and misfiring. I also based her partly on Rosalind Russell’s version of Auntie Mame. Effie is like your crazy aunt that sits at the dining room table and says all the wrong things at dinner.”
For the full interview and more on The Hunger Games, visit Parade.com:
http://www.parade.com/