Actor and producer David Henrie once wanted THE HUNGER GAMES and its multimillion-dollar opportunity, but now he credits missing the role with helping him find his way back to God.
“I was living for pleasure,” Henrie told podcast host Lila Rose in an interview released Oct. 20.
The WIZARDS OF WAVERLY PLACE star recalled owning a house and a car while still wondering why success felt so empty. More money, more travel and more fun brought a brief thrill, then left him hunting for the next thing.
He compared the experience to chewing gum: the flavor fades, so you reach for another piece. He had plenty of what he thought he wanted, but none of it answered the question of what his life was for.
Then came an audition he thought might change everything.
Henrie told Rose he reached the final stage of casting opposite actor Liam Hemsworth for THE HUNGER GAMES, had a chemistry read with actress Jennifer Lawrence and discussed a three-picture contract. He remembered feeling good about the audition and badly wanting the job.
Hemsworth ultimately landed Gale, the casting choice Lionsgate announced in 2011. The studio released THE HUNGER GAMES in March 2012; Henrie’s account of how close he came to joining it remains his recollection.
He doesn’t begrudge Hemsworth the part. Looking back, he told Rose, he thought the casting worked — and missing out left him available for LITTLE BOY.
That set offered an invitation he hadn’t encountered in his years of television work: come have a beer and talk philosophy. Henrie recalled joining conversations with producer Eduardo Verástegui, producer Leo Severino and actor Kevin James while working in Mexico.
“Honestly, I didn’t want anything to do with God,” he said.
He had explored other ideas and wanted something to ease his unhappiness. Instead, those discussions pushed him to consider bigger questions: where the universe came from, whether truth exists outside personal preference and what acknowledging God would require of him.
Henrie described a series of conversations, rather than a single persuasive speech. As his convictions changed, he realized his habits and relationships would have to change, too.
In a separate December 2025 interview with Religion News Service, Henrie also credited James and Verástegui with challenging him and answering his questions about his Catholic upbringing. He described a visit to St. Michael’s Abbey, where he returned to confession after years away.
Taking faith seriously brought practical costs, he told Rose. He stopped partying, lost friendships and began turning down auditions that conflicted with his beliefs, including roles involving nudity or sex scenes.
He also began thinking differently about marriage: rather than simply looking for the right woman, he needed to work on becoming the kind of man who could be a good husband.
His return to faith didn’t mean abandoning entertainment. Disney’s official biography lists him as both the star playing Justin Russo and an executive producer of WIZARDS BEYOND WAVERLY PLACE.
For Henrie, the missed audition now belongs to a different success story. The opportunity he wanted slipped away; the conversations he hadn’t gone looking for changed how he wanted to live.
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