Josh Hutcherson Talks ‘The Hunger Games’ Sequel: “We’ll Probably Start Shooting In the Summer”

The Hunger Games has only been in theaters for a week, but one of the film’s stars — Josh Hutcherson, who plays Peeta in the box office hit — is already revealing new details about the sequel, Catching Fire. 

Josh talked to Ryan Seacrest on his radio show this morning about The Hunger Games' opening weekend success and what fans can expect from the Peeta, Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence) and Gale (Liam Hemsworth) love triangle in the next installment.  OK! GALLERY: JENNIFER LAWRENCE GREETS HUNGER GAMES FANS IN MADRID “Peeta has confessed his real love for Katniss and she has kind of played along with it,” Josh explains. “Then Peeta finds out more or less that she’s just doing it as a show and that’s heartbreaking! That breaks everything Peeta believes in because he’s a very ‘true to yourself’ kind of guy.” As for what Peeta will say when he sees Gale for the first time after the games, Josh says he doesn’t know yet, since the script for Catching Fire hasn't been completed, but he admits that there’s an “unspoken tension” between the two of them. So, when will the next movie will start filming? Josh says the screenwriter, Slumdog Millionaire’s Simon Beaufoy, director Gary Ross and writer Suzanne Collins are hard at work on the script, which will most likely be done soon. OK! NEWS: HUNGER GAMES STAR JOSH HUTCHERSON EXPLAINS TEAM PEENISS & PEETAPHILES TO CONAN O'BRIEN “They just started writing the script recently,” he reveals. “They have a release date already of November of next year, so probably start shooting end of summer, beginning of fall.” But Josh is in no rush to get the ball rolling. He just returned to Los Angeles after enjoying some down time in his hometown of Kentucky while the hysteria surrounding The Hunger Games hit an all-time high. “It's crazy,” Josh says of the film’s success. “We were pushing it so hard and we worked really hard to film it and we obviously had high hopes, but nothing like this. It's beyond my wildest dreams."