SINGAPORE – American actress-singer Rachel Zegler seems to get cast as the girl who falls for bad boys.

In the fantasy-adventure prequel The Hunger Games: The Ballad Of Songbirds & Snakes, which opens in cinemas on Thursday, she plays Lucy Gray Baird, a singer from a nomadic family who meets nobleman Coriolanus Snow (Tom Blyth). She gives her heart to him, despite the possibility he could be using her to advance his career.

Zegler, 22, jokes that Coriolanus and Lucy “should get therapy”. She was speaking from London, where she attended an online press event with other members of the cast.

Lucy’s romantic choices are polar opposites from what she would do in real life.

“I like the best boys, but my fictional characters like the bad boys,” says the actress, who made her feature debut in Steven Spielberg’s musical movie West Side Story (2021) as the headstrong Maria, who begins a romance with Tony (Ansel Elgort), a boy from a family at war with members of her clan.

Another similarity is that Maria and Lucy both sing. Zegler says that at first, she was worried that the dystopian nature of The Hunger Games stories would make her character’s song breaks feel jarring.

But she was happy to learn that in Ballad, Lucy employs singing as a survival strategy and wields her vocal talent like a weapon.

“Lucy says, ‘I don’t sing when I’m told. I sing when I have something to say.’ She uses her voice intentionally and carefully, in ways that tie it to the plot,” says Zegler.

Set 64 years before the events of The Hunger Games (2012), which stars American actress Jennifer Lawrence, the prequel tracks Coriolanus’ life as a teenager. In the original four-movie series that ended in 2015, Coriolanus – played by veteran Canadian actor Donald Sutherland – is the tyrannical head of the state of Panem.

Ballad’s screenplay was adapted from the 2020 novel of the same name by the creator of the book series, American author Suzanne Collins. American director Francis Lawrence returns too, after helming the second to fourth films.

In Ballad, English actor Blyth plays the future paramount leader as an 18-year-old student assigned to mentor Lucy. She has been sent to The Capitol as a Tribute from a poor district.

As Tribute, her job is to compete in the 10th Hunger Games, a set of deadly challenges created to punish districts that took part in a rebellion against the central government.

Blyth says he loved Sutherland’s “deliciously evil” way of portraying the villainous President Snow.

“Playing him and lifting the lid on why he becomes so bad is exciting, because you get to see him as a human being. It’s an absolute dream come true,” says the 28-year-old, who played the titular character in American western series Billy The Kid (2022 to present).

Ballad is his first leading role in a major American feature, having appeared in two British films, the coming-of-age drama Scott And Sid (2018) and the biopic Benediction (2021).

Blyth feels that compared with the original film series, the new The Hunger Games entry is grittier and dives deeper into Panem’s social structures.

It covers not just Coriolanus’ beginnings, but also the rise of the Games as a means by which The Capitol’s ruling classes manipulate and distract the masses.

In the books, entertainment and political control go hand in hand.

Despite the way Collins writes about public spectacles as propaganda tools, Blyth believes that mass entertainment serves a vital psychological purpose.

“The books take on big themes, it’s what drew me to the franchise. For this film, all I can hope for is to make work that resonates with audiences. I hope that for them, when life is tough, they can go to the cinema, eat popcorn and take a breather.

“Music exists in Panem and it exists in our war-torn world. People need to breathe and celebrate together. It makes us human,” he says.

• The Hunger Games: The Ballad Of Songbirds & Snakes opens in cinemas on Thursday.