The ‘Friday Night Lights’ Cast Is Reuniting at the ATX TV Festival to Celebrate Its 20th Anniversary (Exclusive)

Texas forever.

The cast and crew of Friday Night Lights is reuniting at ATX TV Festival, in downtown Austin, Texas, to celebrate the show’s 20th anniversary. The event will take place from May 28 to May 31, 2026.

In an exclusive statement sent to PEOPLE, actress Adrianne Palicki — who portrayed high school student Tyra Collette on the show’s first three seasons — said: “I’m beyond grateful for Friday Night Lights. To say it changed my life is an understatement. Thank you to ATX TV Festival for ‘getting the team back together’ for our 20th anniversary in Austin!”

The reunion and marquee conversation will feature actors Kyle Chandler, Connie Britton and Palicki, 42. Chandler, 60, starred as Coach Eric Taylor, while Britton, 58, played school guidance counselor and coach’s wife Tami Taylor.

The event will also feature showrunner and executive producer Jason Katims, executive producer and writer David Hudgins, executive producer and director Jeffrey Reiner, executive producer and writer Liz Heldens and writer and producer Kerry Ehrin. More cast and crew will be announced. 

The reunion is extra special because Friday Night Lights, which aired five seasons from 2006 to 2011, was filmed in Austin. In tandem with the reunion panel, the festival will honor Friday Night Lights with the second annual “Texas Made” Award, honoring productions and talent that have created opportunities within the state. 

“The Friday Night Lights family is delighted to return to the ATX TV Festival, and to Austin where the show was filmed. We are honored to be receiving the Texas Made award,” Katims added in a press release. 

ATX TV Festival will celebrate its 15th year in 2026.  

Friday Night Lights also starred Aimee Teegarden as Julie Taylor, Scott Porter as Jason Street, Minka Kelly as Lyla Garrity, Brad Leland as her dad Buddy, Zach Gilford as Matt Saracen, Jesse Plemons as Landry Clarke, Gaius Charles as Brian “Smash” Williams and Taylor Kitsch as Tim Riggins. In later seasons, as the original cast of high schoolers graduated from Dillon High (and the Taylors moved to East Dillon Lions High), Michael B. Jordan joined the show as Vince Howard. Matt Lauria, Dora Madison Burge and Jurnee Smollett also joined the series.

Back in November, Gilford and Porter, 46, reunited for PEOPLE’s Sexiest Man Alive issue. Reflecting on the show’s staying power, Gilford, 43, said, “I think it’s just that it feels authentic. It rings true. You feel like you’re watching real people, and it was so grounded. You just get sucked in. There are things that we all have gone through in some version of while growing up. It’s just relatable.”

Porter, 46, said, “The show never talks down to the audience. It asks them to think critically about every single character. I’m just so glad and feel so fortunate that people love the show the way that they do.”

He added, “It feels like a show that gets handed down generationally. I talk to 16-year-olds who have just started watching Friday Night Lights, and they still feel the same about it as people did almost 20 years ago, which is crazy to me.”

In December 2024, Peacock announced they were developing a Friday Night Lights reboot. Friday Night Lights began as a 1990 nonfiction book by H. G. Bissinger about the 1988 Permian High School Panthers football team from Odessa, Texas. It was adapted into a short-lived 1993 TV series and then a 2004 film by Peter Berg, who then developed the well-recognized TV series. Britton is the only person to appear in both the 2004 film and the 2006 TV series.

Badges and passes for the festival are available at ATXFestival.com.