The most well-known faces of television and movies will be walking down the red carpet on January 13 for one of the biggest award shows in Hollywood. Robert Pattinson, Taylor Swift and Adele are only a few names who will be attending this star-studded evening.

It seems like barely any time has passed since this year’s “People’s Choice Awards” took place at the Nokia Theatre in LA. The beautiful Kaley Cuoco (Penny from the “Big Bang Theory”) hosted the “PCAs” where the most popular artists, actors, and actresses were chosen by the public. ‘Hunger Games’ was the overall winners of the night with 5 awards including Favorite Movie, and leading actress Jennifer Lawrence won Favorite Movie Actress.

Tina Fey (“30 Rock”) and Amy Poehler (“Parks and Recreation”) take over for Ricky Gervais hosting the evening. Known to be two of the funniest women on the screen, their instinct for humor is bound to make for an entertaining evening. And they are no newbies to the “Golden Globes:” Fey has won two of her own and Poehler was nominated for one last year. The duo will be sharing the stage with other famous faces who will be presenting. They include Robert Pattinson, Kerry Washington and Jeremy Renner.

There are 25 categories in the “Golden Globes,” and for each there are 5 nominations. Adele’s ‘Skyfall’ goes head to head against Taylor Swift’s ‘Safe and Sound’ and ‘Les Misérables’ for Best Original Song- Motion Picture. Even the hosts are going up against each other for Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series- Comedy or Musical.

Meryl Streep is back this year with her movie ‘Hope Springs’. She is nominated in the category for Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture- Comedy or Musical. Streep has won the most individual awards in the history of the Golden Globes, having 8 to her name. She has also had the most individual nominations, amounting to 27.

This year’s show will be particularly special because afterwards, on January 15, a musical theme composed and performed by internationally renowned musician Yoshiki will be available on iTunes in 111 countries. The money raised will be donated to various charities that the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA) choose.

The “Golden Globes” will be held at the International Ballroom of the Beverly Hilton, in Beverly Hills, CA on January 13 5PT/ 8ET.

Who are you most looking forward to seeing and who are you hoping to win this year?

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Much like the Tributes they portray, the young cast of the film adaptation of the successful book by Suzanne Collins had to immediately jump into the most intensive training of their lives to prepare for the highly physical action of ‘The Hunger Games’.

They beefed up, leaned out and dialed in their skills via a comprehensive but crash-bang, 8-week training program just before production began. Most of all, they immersed themselves into the psychological situations faced by their characters, who each must use everything they’ve got – body, mind and soul – if they have any hope of beating the remote odds against them all.

“We had to take a cast, most of whom had no previous action experience, and turn them into stunt people capable of firing bows, throwing spears and climbing trees,” explains director Gary Ross. “There was a massive training component to making it all real. In the end, we only rarely used stunt doubles.”

Stunt coordinators Chad Stahelski and Allan Poppleton began by teaching combat choreography to the cast – with a twist. “The interesting part is that Gary really didn’t want the action to feel choreographed so we tried to create a more spontaneous feeling of wild, emotional struggle,” explains Stahelski. “We looked at each character and talked about their skills, their energy levels, the way they move and working with all of those elements, ran with the action sequences from there.”

Meanwhile, stunt trainer Logan Hood set up a gym program with an emphasis on functional fitness – using everything from free weights to pushups and pull-ups to rope climbs and high box jumps – with each actor given a custom training program specific to their character. The training also included elements of “free running,” the newfangled sport of urban gymnastics, featuring free-form, creative acrobatic moves over all kinds of obstacles.

“The training had to transfer directly to their characters’ personalities and backgrounds,” explains Hood. “We weren’t interested so much in creating ‘gym bodies’ as in creating seamless, believable performances for each of the Tributes.”

Though main actress Jennifer Lawrence is naturally athletic, she says she worked hard at trying to bring out Katniss’ grace under fire. “Since half the movie for me is running, I worked extensively with a running coach. All day long I was running down mountains, through sticks and brush, and doing it over and over again,” she explains.

“I also worked a lot on climbing, both at rock gyms and on real trees, as well as on vault stunts and even more on archery. The training was really rough, but also really fun.”

The Zen focus of archery was challenging for Lawrence to master – as she learned to use both an old school hunting bow and the futuristic “recurve” bow, a twist on current Olympic bows, used in the Games — but very rewarding when she did. “Archery is a real mind game, all about total focus,” she says, “and if you do one thing wrong, you get whipped with a string going like a hundred miles an hour and it’s painful! I developed a real love-hate relationship with it. Ultimately, the bow became my friend.”

As part of her stunt work in the woods, Lawrence also had to confront a wall of fire created by Special Effects Set Foreman Brandon McLaughlin and Special Effects Coordinator Steve Cremin who built steel trees to withstand a forest blaze that was later enhanced by Visual Effects Supervisor Sheena Duggal. Says McLaughlin: “Gary’s idea was to keep everything real as possible. So instead of a ten-foot fireball that defies reality, he wanted a six-foot fireball moving at Katniss in a way that you really feel it.”

By the time production was underway, Lawrence was ready for whatever Katniss would face. “Jennifer was up for anything, bringing a great attitude to the training,” recalls Robin Bissell.

“Every day she would drive out to UCLA to train then head to the Valley for stunt training, then off to rock climbing and then to Santa Monica for lessons with an Olympic archer. She worked really, really hard and by the time we were filming, she had an amazing acumen for all of Katniss’ skills.”

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Jennifer Lawrence, star of ‘The Hunger Games’, says one thing instantly drew her into the depths of Katniss: “Her strength.” She continues: “I’m always drawn to strong characters, because I want to be like that. This is a girl who has the whole world placed on her shoulders and she becomes a kind of futuristic Joan of Arc.

I just knew that I had so much respect for the books and who she is that there was nothing I wouldn’t do to bring that out in the right way. I also loved that Gary understood that this movie is not about Katniss looking cool with a bow-and-arrow – it’s about her being heartbroken by all that she has to do.”

The actress was undeterred by what she knew would be intense scrutiny by Katniss’ millions of fans. “There’s a lot of pressure when you’re playing a character so many people are crazy about, but I felt I could rest easy because I was committed to do the very best that I could,” Lawrence states. “I knew we had a group of talented people focused on making the best possible movie and that’s what I believed in.”

With Lawrence cast, the next task was to find the boy with whom she is paired in the Games: her co-Tribute, Peeta Mellark, who has long had a secret crush on Katniss but cannot be sure if she is to be trusted. Taking on Peeta is Josh Hutcherson, best known for his roles in ‘The Kids Are All Right’ and ‘Bridge to Teribithia’ — and once again Ross was instantly certain about the choice.

“It was unbelievably clear with Josh. He came in and was able to articulate everything we felt about the character,” the director recalls. “He said ‘Peeta is someone who can disarm the world with his charm, but he knows who he loves and he’s always loved Katniss. He loves her so intensely, she is the one person he would give everything for.’ After that, I felt ‘now I have Peeta and I can do this film.’”

Suzanne Collins was equally taken with the casting. She put it this way to Entertainment Weekly: “If Josh had been bright purple and had six foot wings and gave that audition, I’d have been like ‘Cast him!’ ‘We can work around the wings!’ He was that good.”

Hutcherson remembers that the minute he began reading the book, he was swept up and felt a connection with Peeta. “I’ve never seen a character so close to me as a person,” he says. “His self-deprecating humor, his outlook on life, and the way he wants to stay true to who he is no matter what are all things I could really relate to from my own life. I was very into Peeta from the get-go.”

As the Games get underway, Peeta becomes even clearer about his aim. “His goal is to make sure Katniss survives,” Hutcherson explains. “His greatest skill is his ability to talk with people, to negotiate and manipulate, and he uses that not in a conniving way, but to protect Katniss.“

That was easy for Hutcherson, given his rapport with Lawrence. “I think Jen perfectly encapsulates a young woman who finds the power to take care of herself and others around her. She has both a hardness and a vulnerability that’s beautiful and really genuine,” he says of his co-star.

Playing Katniss’ longtime best friend in District 12 is Australian actor Liam Hemsworth.  He, too, came to the set with a very strong sense of his character. “Gale is a decent but strong-minded guy who hates nothing more than the Capitol,” says the actor. “He hates everything they stand for. He hates what they do to people.

And he thinks the Hunger Games are very, very wrong. With Katniss, he’s always felt they were each other’s only escape from this horrible world they live in. But once Katniss is picked for the Hunger Games, he is forced to watch this whole thing unfold with Peeta, wondering who she is really meant to end up with.”

Notes Jon Kilik: “Casting ‘The Hunger Games’ was like fitting pieces of an epic puzzle together and Liam as Gale was one of those perfectly matching pieces. He’s got such a strong physical presence, and a kind of natural heroic quality, that really embodies who Gale is in the book.”

District 12 is also home to the one person who fuels Katniss’ survival instincts like no other: Primrose, the little sister Katniss swore she would always protect and whose place she takes in the Games. In auditions, Ross was immediately impressed with Willow Shields, an 11-year-old from Albuquerque, New Mexico. “Willow was one of those amazing finds, and I was dumbstruck that a girl at her age could have so much talent,” says Ross.

Says Shields, “Prim is someone who has had a really rough life and yet she’s always really helpful and nice to her sister.”

Once Katniss is sent to the Capitol, Primrose is left in the care of her traumatized, widowed mother, who finally begins to awaken from her daze. Mrs. Everdeen is played by Paula Malcomson, the Irish actress seen on “Deadwood,” “Lost” and “Sons of Anarchy.” For Malcomson, ‘The Hunger Games’ was a true ensemble experience.

“Gary put together a great cast. He is someone for whom every detail is precious and that’s the stuff actors love:  all that connective tissue that allows you to explore the moments between the moments,” she says. “I found it exciting to see this phenomenal book brought to life by people who cared so much about what they were doing.”

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