“She’s kind of like Cruella,” the actress tells EW, referencing the character’s elaborate wardrobe.

How Glenn Close achieved a ‘terrifying’ look for Sunrise on the Reaping’s Drusilla Sickle

“She’s kind of like Cruella,” the actress tells EW, referencing the character’s elaborate wardrobe.

By Shania Russell

Shania Russell

Shania Russell is a news writer at *, *with five years of experience. Her work has previously appeared in SlashFilm and Paste Magazine.

EW's editorial guidelines

August 26, 2026 11:00 a.m. ET

Leave a Comment

Glenn Close as Drusilla Sickle in ‘The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping’. Credit:

Murray Close/Lionsgate

- Glenn Close is pulling back the curtain on the creation of *Sunrise on the Reaping*’s Drusilla Sickle.

- “The first day on set with her, I was like, ‘Glenn, is this you? Are you in there?,’” costar Elle Fanning recalls.

- Close also shares what the *Hunger Games* prequel character has in common with her iconic Disney villain, Cruella de Vil.

Glenn Close has some frightening beauty tips to share from the mind of Drusilla Sickle.

The *Hunger Game**s* prequel *Sunrise on the Reaping *will see the eight-time Oscar nominee step into another villainous role as the ruthless Capitol resident in charge of escorting District 12’s tributes to their likely death. And when it comes to both her cruelty and her costume, Close tells ** that Drusilla reminded her of another wicked mind that she’s embodied.

“She’s kind of like Cruella,” Close says, referencing the dog-skinning Disney villain she plays in 1996’s *101 Dalmatians*. “You don’t see the character until you get into the full makeup and drag of it all.”

So naturally, Close went all out when it came to developing Drusilla’s look — starting with her face.

Glenn Close photographed exclusively for EW.

Months before shooting, the 79-year-old found herself peering into a mirror, trying to determine the best way to realize the character described in Suzanne Collins‘ novel. The author paints a rather frightening picture of the woman, noting that Drusilla uses thumbtacks to pull her skin back taut, dons military-inspired fashion pieces, and even wears a riding crop on her boot (a weapon that readers know she is more than willing to wield).

To figure out Drusilla’s look, Close first used her fingers to stretch back her features.

“I was just thinking about the mouth. And I said, ‘You can’t go up, because that’s the Joker.’ So I looked at myself in the mirror and went like this,” she says, pulling the corners of her mouth horizontally. “And I said, ‘There it is.’ Then I sent Francis a picture, and he said, ‘Yeah, you know, I like it.’”

For better or worse, that eventually became part of her daily makeup routine for the shoot.

“I think it aged me, like, 50 years,” Close quips with a laugh.

Glenn Close photographed exclusively for EW.

Achieving Drusilla’s look also involved taping back features like Close’s eyes and nose, wearing a new set of teeth to give the character a “protruding lip,” and donning a prosthetic to make her nose stick up “like a pig.”

Director Francis Lawrence notes that from the very beginning, Close was thrilled to join the process of creating her character from the ground up.

“There was no template for Drusilla, other than a description in the book,” he says, noting that many of the novel’s other characters were introduced onscreen in the original four *Hunger Games* movies. But where some *SOTR* stars had to look to those future iterations, Close got to help decide “how [Drusilla] carries herself, how her clothing fits, her voices” and all the other minute details.

And she was thrilled to do so.  “It was a great playground for me to do that,” Close says.

Mckenna Grace, Joseph Zada, Whitney Peak, Glenn Close, and Elle Fanning photographed exclusively for EW.

It ultimately took many people to pull Drusilla together. “I had a prosthetic makeup artist, I had a regular makeup artist, we had a wig maker, and then you had the costumer,” Close explains. “That was my core team. And we sat down and just kind of figured out the looks. It was really, really fun.”

With their help, Close disappeared into her character. Elle Fanning, who stars as *SOTR*’s Effie Trinket and previously shared the screen with Close in 2014’s* Low Down, *hardly recognized her beneath the trappings of Drusilla’s wardrobe.

“The first day on set with her, I was like, ‘Glenn, is this you? Are you in there?,’” Fanning recalls. “I mean, she was stretching her face back with, I don’t know, I guess it was being taped back. It is frightening and amazing and I’m like, ‘You look so different! This doesn’t even look like you!’”

Praising Close’s performance in the role, Fanning notes that she created a character that is “larger than life and quite evil.”

Elle Fanning and Glenn Close photographed exclusively for EW.

Their castmates certainly agree. “She’s incredible and terrifying,” teases Mckenna Grace, who clashes with Close as the fierce tribute Maysilee Donner. “Such a diva, Drusilla.”

Whitney Peak, who stars as Lenore Dove Baird, says she was “gobsmacked” when Close took the stage for the reaping scene. “It was incredible to watch her work,” she says. “She is scary and intimidating as Drusilla.”

***Get your daily dose of entertainment news, celebrity updates, and what to watch with our ******EW Dispatch newsletter******.***

Close doesn’t mince words about the darker elements of her character, especially when it comes to the District 12 residents. “She doesn’t give a s---,” the actress says. “She’s pretty fed up with them because they’re the worst and they’re dirty and they smell and they’ve never won.”

She adds, “[Drusilla] can’t wait to get out of District 12  and talk about it at a dinner party.”

Little does she know that a certain District 12 tribute, Joseph Zada’s Haymitch Abernathy, will leave a big mark on Panem with his performance in the arena.

Dive into EW’s full cover story to learn more.

- Film Worlds & Fandoms

- The Hunger Games Fandom

Original Article on Source

Source: “EW The”