Jennifer Lawrence shares thoughts on ‘emotional’ Hunger Games reunion on Call Her Daddy podcast

The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping, a prequel set 24 years before the first Hunger Games movie, will hit theaters on November 20, 2026. It follows a young Haymitch (Katniss’s mentor in the original movie, played by Woody Harrelson) as he is forced to participate in the Quarter Quell, a special Hunger Games that features twice as many tributes as normal years.

The film reunites Woody Harrelson, Josh Hutcherson (Peeta), and Jennifer Lawrence (Katniss) on screen for the first time since The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2. Recently, Lawrence sat down with the Call Her Daddy podcast and finally broke her silence to share her thoughts on the long-awaited reunion.

The history of ‘The Hunger Games’

Suzanne Collins wrote the original trilogy in The Hunger Games series beginning in 2008. The first film based on the novels came out in 2012, starring Lawrence as heroine Katniss Everdeen, Hutcherson as Peeta Mellark (another player in the games and a love interest for Katniss), and Harrelson as Haymitch. The film quickly became a box office hit, earning a little over $695 million.

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire followed in 2013, then The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1 in 2014 and The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2 in 2015. At the time, Lawrence was best known for her phenomenal performance in Winter’s Bone and for her turn as Raven/Mystique in X-Men: First Class; The Hunger Games, though, soon made her a household name.

A reunion 11 years in the making

Until her interview with Call Her Daddy, Lawrence had stayed mum on her return for the upcoming movie. When Deadline first announced in December 2025 that she and Hutcherson would return, the film’s production company didn’t comment. The day before the Call Her Daddy interview was posted, Lawrence told Allure when asked in a video about whether she could tease her return, “Well, no, of course not. Maybe I’m not.”

However, she told the podcast about returning to the franchise, “It was so emotional. Josh [Hutcherson] and I didn’t walk to the bathroom without our arms around each other. It was so beautiful[…] It was so crazy because it was the same crew. It was the same camera guys, the same AD who I’ve worked with a million times too because I love him, and Josh and Woody.”

Lawrence also shared that despite just over a decade passing, her dynamic with Harrelson and Hutcherson hadn’t changed at all. She jokingly explained, “Woody obviously came through the window of my hotel room uninvited because it would not be the same if he listened to boundaries and used a door.”

The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping stars Joseph Zada as Haymitch, along with Ralph Fiennes, McKenna Grace, Kieran Culkin, Ben Wang, Elle Fanning, and Glenn Close (and the trailer looks amazing). As of now, box office trackers predict an opening weekend of $55 to $65 million, which would put it ahead of The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes’ opening weekend take of $44.6 million.

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