McKenna Grace Channels Katniss’ Girl on Fire Look at Sunrise on the Reaping Berlin Photocall

If there was ever a moment to go big on a press tour, this was it. McKenna Grace walked into a Berlin photocall on Monday, November 2, dressed as a living tribute to the franchise that made the whole tour possible — a custom Cong Tri gown built to echo Katniss Everdeen’s famous “girl on fire” look from The Hunger Games: Catching Fire. It was bold, it was fiery, and honestly, it was the kind of fashion choice that stops a room cold.

Grace, 20, is in the thick of promoting The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping, the new prequel that hits theaters on November 20. The Berlin stop took place at the Zoo Palast, where she posed alongside co-stars Joseph Zada, Whitney Peak, and Molly McCann. But let’s be real — the dress did most of the talking.

The gown took its cues directly from the outfit Jennifer Lawrence wore as Katniss during the tribute chariot ride that kicked off the 75th Hunger Games, also known as the Third Quarter Quell, in Catching Fire. Flames licking up the skirt, a silhouette that reads pure Capitol spectacle — it was a wink to the fans who have spent more than a decade quoting that scene. And Grace wore it like someone who knows exactly what it means to this fandom.

She finished the look with blonde hair and full bangs, gold earrings, and a black mesh scarf wrapped around her neck. The styling kept things elegant rather than costumey, which is a harder trick to pull off than it sounds. A tribute look can tip into cosplay fast. This one didn’t. It read as high fashion first, homage second — which is probably why the photos blew up the way they did.

A Press Tour Built on Homages

This isn’t the first time Grace has nodded to the original trilogy on this tour. Since the Sunrise on the Reaping press run kicked off, she has been steadily paying tribute to the tributes and stars who came before her, and fans have noticed. Each stop has felt a little like a love letter to the franchise’s history, and Berlin was the loudest one yet.

It makes sense. Grace isn’t just a new face parachuting into Panem. She plays Maysilee Donner, a fellow District 12 tribute in the 50th Hunger Games — the Second Quarter Quell — and a character with a direct line to Katniss herself. In the books, Maysilee was the original owner of the mockingjay pin that later became Katniss’s signature. So when Grace steps out in a “girl on fire” dress, it’s not random. It’s a thread pulled straight through the story.

The prequel is set 24 years before the original Hunger Games story and follows a 16-year-old Haymitch Abernathy, played by Joseph Zada, as he is reaped for the 50th Games. Whitney Peak plays Lenore Dove Baird, Haymitch’s girlfriend, while Grace’s Maysilee becomes his unlikely ally inside the arena. The film is directed by Francis Lawrence, who helmed the later original-trilogy films, and adapts Suzanne Collins’s 2025 novel of the same name.

The cast around them is stacked. Elle Fanning plays a younger Effie Trinket, Ralph Fiennes takes on President Coriolanus Snow, Jesse Plemons is a young Plutarch Heavensbee, Kieran Culkin plays host Caesar Flickerman, and Glenn Close appears as District 12 escort Drusilla Sickle. Maya Hawke, Kelvin Harrison Jr., and Billy Porter round out an ensemble that has had fans buzzing since the first casting announcements.

Who Is Maysilee Donner?

For anyone who hasn’t read the book yet, Maysilee is one of the most interesting new additions to Panem. On the surface, she comes across as polished and particular — the kind of girl who cares about how things look, even in a place designed to strip that away. But that turns out to be the point. As Haymitch comes to understand, her insistence on beauty and dignity is its own kind of defiance. The Capitol can take a lot from the districts, but she refuses to let it take that.

Inside the arena, Maysilee and Haymitch form a cautious alliance, and their partnership becomes one of the emotional cores of the story. Grace has talked about how daunting it felt to take on the role, especially after seeing all the early fan casting for the part. That honesty landed with fans, who had spent months debating who should play her. Landing the role is one thing. Living up to a fandom’s imagination is another.

Grace also plays Maysilee’s twin sister, Merrilee Donner, in the film, and she is credited with the film’s songs as well. It’s a lot of hats for one press tour, and she seems to be wearing all of them with ease. Early reactions out of the London premiere in late October were glowing, with some critics calling the prequel among the strongest entries in the franchise. Full reviews are still to come, but the buzz is real.

The Cosmopolitan Cover and the Disney Dream

The Berlin photocall wasn’t the only headline Grace made this week. She also just landed a Cosmopolitan cover for the magazine’s upcoming winter issue, alongside her Sunrise on the Reaping co-stars Whitney Peak and Maya Hawke. In the interview, she got candid about the kinds of roles she turns down — and why.

“At this point, I definitely don’t do nudity or very hypersexual things,” Grace told the magazine. “I respect anybody who can, but it’s terrifying to me. I don’t know if that’ll ever change. It’s not like I only do wholesome things — my character literally gets gutted by Ghostface in Scream — but my dream is to try and be a Disney princess someday.”

It’s a refreshingly straightforward answer, and it drew a lot of praise online. Grace has been acting since she was a small child — Gifted, I, Tonya, The Handmaid’s Tale, Ghostbusters: Afterlife, Fuller House — and she’s now navigating that tricky shift from child star to adult leading lady on her own terms. The line she draws isn’t about avoiding dark material. Anyone who has seen her horror work knows she is fine with dark. It’s about what she is willing to show on screen, and she owns that distinction without apologizing for it.

The Disney princess dream isn’t new, either. She has talked about it since her Troop Zero days, and the recent chatter around a live-action Tangled has only fueled the speculation. At the 98th Academy Awards in March, she walked the red carpet in a princess-pink ballgown, and during this press tour she has also channeled Rapunzel. Whether or not a crown is in her future, she’s clearly having fun keeping the dream alive.

Why the Berlin Look Landed So Hard

Part of what made the Berlin moment work is timing. With Sunrise on the Reaping arriving in theaters on November 20 — with early-access screenings starting November 18 — the press tour is in its final sprint. Every appearance counts, and a look that ties the new film to the most iconic fashion moment of the original trilogy is smart marketing and genuine fandom rolled into one.

There’s also something sweet about a new star honoring the old one so openly. Jennifer Lawrence’s Katniss defined a generation of young adult cinema, and Grace stepping into that visual language — not to copy it, but to tip her hat to it — says a lot about how she sees her place in this franchise. She’s not trying to replace anyone. She’s joining a lineage.

And the fans? They ate it up. Social media lit up with side-by-side comparisons within hours, and the consensus was pretty clear: the girl on fire still burns, just in a new dress, on a new tribute, in a new decade. If the goal of a press tour look is to get people talking about the movie, this one did its job before the photocall was even over.

With less than three weeks to go until release day, Grace and the rest of the cast are still on the road, and if Berlin is any indication, the fashion moments aren’t done yet. The arena awaits. And if McKenna Grace keeps dressing like this, Panem’s newest tribute might just steal the whole tour.

Source: Just Jared