Jennifer Lawrence Almost Passed on Playing ‘The Girl on Fire’

(PCM) It’s safe to say that Jennifer Lawrence’s role as Katniss Everdeen in The Hunger Games catapulted the indie actress to super stardom but the star recently admitted in an interview at the Toronto International Film Festival that she almost passed on playing “the girl on fire.”

While Lawrence did show off some serioues acting chops in the Oscar-nominated film, Winter’s Bone, the 22-year-old can thank the dystopian blockbuster for making her a household name. Lawrence said she almost said no to the coveted role of Katniss Everdeen, the heroine of Suzanne Collins’ hit trilogy, because she never pictured herself acting in big studio films.

The starlet mulled over taking on the role for three days because ”just saying yes to this one thing could completely change my life, and I don’t know if it’s going to be for the better,” Lawrence said.

Hunger Games fans can thank Mrs. Lawrence for changing her daughter’s mind.

“She was like, `You’re being a hypocrite, because you always say you don’t care about the size of the movies.’ Because when I was doing indies, everybody was always like, `Why don’t you ever do a studio?’ I’d say, `Because I don’t care about the size of the movie. I care about the story,’” Lawrence said. “And my mom was like, `Now you have a story you like, and you’re not going to do it because of the size.’

After some persuasion from her mother and a little soul-searching, Lawrence had a change of heart.

“I wanted to do it. I wanted to play this character. I was scared of the aftermath, but you can’t say no to things because you’re scared. You just have to go for it,” she said.

I think most people will agree that the actress made the right decision and on Monday she will begin filming Catching Fire, the sequel to the first Hunger Games flick. Between filming The Hunger Games, Lawrence made some time to squeeze in a few smaller films including Silver Linings Playbook, which she was promoting in Toronto.

The dramedy also starring Bradley Cooper is already receiving some early Oscar buzz and is set to hit theatres this November. Lawrence is also testing the horror genre in House at the End of the Street which opens September 21.

Looks like life post-Hunger Games isn’t so bad after all and the actress seems to be enjoying the ride. Lawrence had some initial reservations about splitting Mockingjay, the third novel in Collins’ trilogy, into two parts, until she heard how much cash she’d be raking in.

“You want everything in there, but you don’t have enough room, and you’re trying to decide what’s going to get cut and what isn’t,” Lawrence said. “So it was a relief on the last one to know that we don’t really have to cut anything. We have enough time, we have enough room to really tell this story to the fullest, and we don’t need to cut anything.

“So that’s my artistic answer. It’s a very diplomatic answer. But what I’m really thinking is yacht, yacht. My own island.”