Snow is ready for his close up.

After all, while The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes once again sees a District 12 tribute and Coriolanus Snow face off, in the Hunger Games prequel it’s a younger iteration of Panem’s future president, played by Tom Blyth, who serves as the film’s center. 

“I will say the biggest difference,” director Francis Lawrence, who also directed three of the original Hunger Games films, exclusively told E! News, “is that the true protagonist of this is Snow, is Tom Blyth. That’s the big change. We’ve made young Snow the protagonist of this.”

And for Lawrence, the 28-year-old more than rose to the occasion. 

“For me, without giving too many spoilers,” he revealed, “there’s a scene almost near the very end in the forest with Snow when he’s going dark. There’s very, very little dialogue. And I think Tom’s performance is just phenomenal.”

In fact, it proved crucial for the Red Sparrow director.