All 41 Hunger Games: Sunrise On The Reaping Characters Explained

One of the many, many, many excellent things about the Hunger Games franchise, which began its life as a series of novels by Suzanne Collins and subsequently got adapted into a film franchise, is that there's so much story yet to tell. Yes, we were introduced to Collins' dystopian portrait of North America, Panem, and its twelve districts — governed by the oppressive and wealthy Capitol — in "The Hunger Games," back in 2008, when hit bookshelves in 2008 and detailed the violent titular games that enlist one girl and one boy from each district and force them to fight to the death, only for a single winner to emerge. Through the eyes of Katniss Everdeen, played by Jennifer Lawrence in the original film series, we watch the cruelty and excess of the Capitol, the rebellion that arises, and the Games themselves; in Collins' first prequel, "The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes," we got to know a young version of future Capitol president Coriolanus Snow (Tom Blyth in that adaptation).

Now, "Sunrise on the Reaping" is on its way to the movie theater, and just like Collins' 2025 novel, this prequel focuses on Haymitch Abernathy, Katniss' District 12 mentor and former victor played in the original films by Woody Harrelson. Beyond Haymitch, though, there's a whole new cast of characters to meet ... and while some of them might be familiar, they're still different versions of characters you already know. Here are all 41 of the characters involved in "The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping." Light spoilers ahead!

You can't talk about "The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping" without talking about its protagonist Haymitch Abernathy, who's played in his younger years in this movie by Joseph Zada. Unlike Woody Harrelson's Haymitch, this version of Haymitch is young, idealistic, and deeply in love ... all of which changes when, after another tribute attempts to escape and is killed, Haymitch is forced to compete in that year's Hunger Games.

To make matters much worse, the Hunger Games host "special" versions every quarter of a century called the Quarter Quells ... and Haymitch's Games happen to be the 50th installment. As a result, two boys and two girls are chosen from each district, bringing the tribute total to a whopping 48 instead of 24, but Haymitch manages to win when all is said and done. (We learn this in "The Hunger Games," so the spoiler isn't that he wins, but how.) Haymitch is one of the most complicated characters in the entire franchise, and his origin story in "Sunrise on the Reaping" is truly gut-wrenching.

One of Haymitch's fellow tributes is Maysilee Donner, played by Mckenna Grace (who also briefly portrays Maysilee's twin sister Merrilee). Maysilee can be a bit of a bully, but when she and Haymitch end up in the arena, they become unexpected allies — but honestly, the most "vital" thing about Maysilee is that she's the original owner of the mockingjay pin that becomes a symbol of the rebellion led by Katniss. (Her best friend in District 12 is also Katniss's future mother.)

Alongside Haymitch Abernathy and Maysilee Donner, the other male tribute from District 12 is Wyatt Callow, who is played in the film by Ben Wang. Wyatt is taciturn and keeps to himself, but he proves to be a shrewd ally towards his fellow District 12 tributes ... and understands the overall game well thanks to the fact that he and his family have been betting on Hunger Games outcomes for years.

The fourth and final District 12 tribute is Louella McCoy, a kind and young girl who used to call Haymitch her "sweetheart" thanks to an enormous crush on him (and who's played in the film by Molly McCann). Something horrifying happens to Louella before the games even begin, and we won't spoil the specifics here ... but suffice to say, a hasty replacement is required.

Make no mistake: Lou Lou and Louella McCoy are two distinct people. Played by Iona Bell, Lou Lou, who's given that nickname by Haymitch, is a sort of horrifying body double who competes in the Games in Louella's stead, and she's one of the most unsettling characters in the entire Hunger Games franchise. She also may or may not hail from District 11.

As he prepares to compete in the Hunger Games, Haymitch assembles as many allies as possible — a complicated prospect, considering how the games work. One of them is the smart but extremely diminutive Ampert Latier (Percy Daggs IV), the son of a former Hunger Games victor chosen for the Second Quarter Quell as punishment for the Latier family. (Are you a fan of "Veronica Mars" who wants to feel old? Ampert is played by the son of Percy Daggs III, who portrayed Wallace Fennell on the series.)

If you've seen a Hunger Games film or read one of the books, you know that with even 24 tributes, you don't get to know all of them that well. Still, here's a rundown of the ones we'll spend at least a little time with in the film. Jhaleil Swaby's Panache Baker from District 1 is described by Wyatt Callow as a "hothead" but a "crowd favorite," and he's joined by the beautiful but vicious Silka Sharp (Laura Marcus), also from the wealthiest district.

The only vital District 4 tribute is Maritte, who's good with a trident (District 4 is the fishing district) and who's played by Sky Frances; as for District 6's Wellie, she's extraordinarily skittish and nervous and is played by Rada Rae. Ringina (Tatyana Muzondo) from District 7 is friendly to Haymitch despite being his competitor, and Alina Reid's District 9 tribute Kerna is, like Wellie, emotional and unfortunately kind.

Kerna is flanked by her fellow District 9 tribute Clayton (Salimou Thiam), and the group is rounded out by Buck from District 10 (John Doeble) and Hull from District 11 (Kaine Buffonge).

Plutarch Heavensbee is a slyly subversive and deceptively brutal Game Maker in the original Hunger Games movies, where he's played by the late, great Philip Seymour Hoffman. In "Sunrise on the Reaping," Academy Award nominee and all-around superstar Jesse Plemons fills Hoffman's shoes, and despite his high status in the Capitol, he proves to be an invaluable source of help for Haymitch.

It's tough to fill the shoes of someone like Elizabeth Banks, especially when those shoes are insane, exaggerated heels. Enter Elle Fanning, star of "Sentimental Value" and the excellent series "Margo's Got Money Troubles" who appears in "Sunrise on the Reaping" as a younger version of Banks' Capitol stylist Effie Trinket. Effie is generally friendly with Haymitch and she takes over as his stylist ... but he's put off by her staunchly pro-Capitol stance.

Aside from a voice role in Andy Serkis' take on "Animal Farm" in 2025, "The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping" marks "Succession" veteran Kieran Culkin's first return to the big screen since 2024's "A Real Pain," the directorial debut from his co-star Jesse Eisenberg that won Culkin an Oscar. So who's he playing? That would be Caesar Flickerman, the bombastic Hunger Games TV host portrayed by Stanley Tucci in the original films ... and whose ancestor Lucky Flickerman is played by Jason Schwartzman in "The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes."

Ralph Fiennes is now the third actor to play Coriolanus Snow. In the original movies, he's portrayed, in his older age and the final years of his life, by Donald Sutherland (who passed away in 2024). In "The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes," we learn Coriolanus' villain origin story, and he's played by Tom Blyth. Now, in "Sunrise on the Reaping," we see President Snow as he starts to grapple with aging, leans into full tyranny, and trains himself to withstand poison — something he's known for in the original series and which causes his mouth to fill with bloody sores.

In Suzanne Collins' novel, Haymitch describes reliable Capitol chaperone Drusilla Sickle, who always gets assigned to District 12, as "a plastic-faced woman" who could be of any age because she "has a line of what look like fancy thumbtacks encircling her face, pulling her skin back and pinning it in place." In the film, Drusilla will be played by Glenn Close, but the Oscar-nominated legend will be barely recognizable so that she perfectly mimics Drusilla's many Capitol-influenced plastic surgeries. She also has a ... combative relationship with the tributes.

Tony and Emmy Award-winning actor Billy Porter joins the Hunger Games franchise for "Sunrise on the Reaping" as Magno Stift, a Capitol stylist assigned to the District 12 tributes who is also Drusilla Sickle's legal husband. (They also have a combative relationship.) When Haymitch first lays eyes on Magno, he describes him thusly: 

"Magno Stift's sun-leathered skin has been tattooed with a snakeskin pattern. He wears a long shirt made of metal diamonds and no visible pants. His sandals lace all the way up to his pelvis, and from each of his ears dangle tiny, living garter snakes that twist and turn in misery."

Magno ends up missing crucial Games events after licking toads and hallucinating, after he also makes a mistake and sends tributes to their televised interviews in trainign outfits and disgraces himself ... but Porter will likely make a meal of his potentially limited screen time regardless.

After a brief appearance in the hit Hulu series "Tell Me Lies," Iris Apatow — sister of "Euphoria" star Maude and daughter of actress Leslie Mann and director and writer Judd Apatow — will show up in Panem as Proserpina Trinket, Effie's younger sister. As a member of Haymitch's prep team, Proserpina helps her sister, well, prepare him for the pre-arena "festivities."

Proserpina Trinket isn't the only prep team member we meet through Haymitch — she's aided by her fellow Capitol denizen Vitus, played in the film by Edvin Ryding. Vitus is on the periphery of Haymitch's story for the entire narrative, and if Ryding looks familiar, it's because he plays Swedish Amphibious Corps member Erik Sundqvist in "28 Years Later" (marking a "reunion" of sorts between Ryding and Ralph Fiennes, who plays Dr. Ian Kelson in that film.)

There are a few other Capitol residents who play small but important roles in Haymitch's story in "The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping." Hersilia, played by Sandra Förster, works as a trainer to help the tributes prepare for battle, and Jax Guerrero's Tibby is an overly helpful transportation officer.

One of the most tragic figures in "The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping" is Beetee Latier, a former District 3 victor who's played by Kelvin Harrison Jr. in this prequel film and who works as a mentor to new tributes. (In the original movies, he's played by Oscar nominee Jeffrey Wright, who brings a quiet, pensive energy to the role.) So why is he so tragic? After a failed attempt to rebel against the Capitol, Beetee is severely punished and is forced to watch his own son, the aforementioned Ampert, compete in the Second Quarter Quell. Despite knowing that he'll almost certainly watch his child perish, Beetee is an invaluable asset to Haymitch ... and even comes up with a potentially dangerous plan to interfere with the Games themselves.

Beetee isn't the only former victor turned mentor who works with Haymitch to prepare him for the super-dangerous arena. Another is Wiress, who's portrayed by Amanda Plummer in "The Hunger Games: Catching Fire" and is played by "Stranger Things" veteran Maya Hawke in "Sunrise on the Reaping." Wiress, who competed in the previous year's Games and won them by utilizing a field of reflective surfaces to confuse her more physically powerful opponents, is brilliant — and instrumental in Beetee's scheme.

The final major mentor we meet in "The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping" is Mags Flanagan, played by "Sex and the City" standout Lynn Cohen (who passed away in 2020) in the original films with Lili Taylor taking over the role in the prequel. Hailing from District 4, Mags is one of the older victors — it's not clear which games she won, but it's either the 11th, 12th, or 13th go-around — but that doesn't diminish her wisdom.

Whitney Peak, whom you might recognize from the unfortunately lackluster "Gossip Girl" reboot that aired on HBO Max in the early 2020s, appears in "The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping" as Lenore Dove Baird, the love of Haymitch's life who lives amongst the musical Covey in District 12. A potential descendant of the only other District 12 victors in history — Rachel Zegler's Lucy Gray Baird, the real protagonist of "The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes" — Lenore is rebellious, headstrong, and head over heels in love with Haymitch. This is a love story in the Hunger Games universe, though — so it ends tragically.

A young widow whose husband was killed in a mining accident (District 12 is the mining district, which is also how Katniss loses her own father years later) and mother to four children, Willamae Abernathy, Haymitch's mother, runs a tight ship. Played by Kara Tointon in "The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping," she's also devastated to see her oldest child be randomly chosen to compete in the Second Quarter Quell after the original tribute tries to escape the premises.

We don't actually meet either of Haymitch's two sisters during the narrative of "The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping," but we do meet his beloved younger brother Sid Abernathy, played by Smylie Bradwell. In the book, Haymitch tells Sid "'you're twice as smart as me and ten times as brave'" right as Haymitch is "reaped," leaving Sid in tears in Willamae's arms as Haymitch departs for the Capitol.

Because Katniss' father Burdock Everdeen dies in a mining accent years before the narrative of "The Hunger Games" begins, we've never seen him on screen ... but in "Sunrise on the Reaping," he's played by Scot Greenan. Burdock is one of Haymitch's close friends and supports him before and after the games in District 12, even as Haymitch suffers unimaginable losses.

Now that we've covered some of the more major District 12 players, let's go over a brief list of the tertiary players. Grace Ackary will appear in "The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping" as Asterid March, best friend to Maysilee Donner and Burdock Everdeen's future wife (meaning, yes, that she grows up to mother Katniss), with Ackary taking over the role from original actress Paula Malcolmson. Jeffrey Hallman is also playing a character that was originated by a different actor elsewhere in the Hunger Games franchise — Clerk Carmine, a Baird relative of Lenore Dove who's portrayed by Konstantin Taffet in "The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes."

We've obliquely referenced Haymitch's ... unconventional reaping, and it's all thanks to Woodbine Chance (Serafin Mishiev), whose name is initially chosen and whose escape results not just in his death at the hands of Peacekeepers, but Haymitch being chosen in his place. Elsewhere, there's local liquor brewer Hattie Meeney (Melody Chikakane Brown), with whom Haymitch works even though the practice isn't strictly legal, Haymitch's friend Blair (Devon Singletary), and Louella's father Mr. McCoy (Jefferson White).

Even though the events of "The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping" predate the births of Katniss Everdeen and her eventual partner Peeta Mellark (Josh Hutcherson), both Hutcherson and Jennifer Lawrence are set to reprise their roles in the prequel (according to a December 2025 report in The Hollywood Reporter). So ... how will that work?

Whether or not Woody Harrelson will also join the party is, as of this writing, anybody's guess — but when you consider that the entirety of "Sunrise on the Reaping" is designed to explain why Haymitch is so surly and traumatized by the time he coaches Katniss and Peeta through their first games, it seems entirely possible that we'll see a scene of an older Haymitch sharing this story with his two successors. It's been decades since we saw Lawrence and Hutcherson as Katniss and Peeta, and it'll be pretty great to watch these two talented performers step back into roles that earned them worldwide fame and acclaim.

"The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping" hits theaters on November 20, 2026.