Lawrence downplays her Oscar award

BEVERLY HILLS, California - It’s not always easy being an Oscar-winner. When Jennifer Lawrence returned to the set of “The Hunger Games: Catching Fire” after winning the best-actress Academy Award for last year’s “Silver Linings Playbook,” she was treated to a round of applause. Then the teasing began.

“I kind of wish just the ‘Hunger Games’ group didn’t know about [the award] because anytime I mess up my lines, Woody [Harrelson] is like, ‘Ya better give that Oscar back!’” said Lawrence.

“But when I got back, I told everybody that things were going to be very, very different,” the actress said, puffing out her chest before bursting into a bout of laughter. “The applause was sweet, but really it was like, ‘Let’s move on.’”

And move on she did, back in theaters this weekend as heroine Katniss Everdeen in the “Hunger Games: Catching Fire” sequel. Although the role isn’t traditional Oscar material, playing a bow and arrow-bearing fighter in the screen adaptation of Suzanne Collins’ best-selling trilogy also isn’t hurting Lawrence’s established Oscar track.

“I don’t really look for something [like Oscar potential] when I sit down to read a script,” Lawrence said in a recent interview at a “Catching Fire” media event.

“There is not really a lot of thought. It’s a bizarre instinctual and emotional thing that just hits me.”

Able to tackle dramatic and comedy roles with ease - both in studio blockbusters and smaller independent films - Lawrence says her continued universal success wasn’t by design.

“It just sort of happened and everybody complimented me on it,” said the actress. “I started out in indies and I always imagined myself being in smaller movies for the rest of my career. Then ‘Hunger Games’ came along and I was in a big pickle. I would have done it in a heartbeat if it were an indie, but it was giant! I had to take a few days to think about it.”

Lawrence accepted the role largely because of her fondness for the strong-spirited lead character. “The stakes are high for her,” said the actress. “It’s exciting to have a female hero like this. It says a lot about our society.”

Though she was already on Hollywood’s radar after starring in the acclaimed 2010 drama “Winter’s Bone,” which gained her an Oscar nomination, Lawrence said “Hunger Games” raised the bar. “It took everything to a different place that I could have never imagined. And the [Oscar] did wonderful things for my career. I’m just rolling with it.” AP