Why Don’t We Have a George Washington Movie?
Looking for America's First Action Hero on the Big Screen
Today would have been George Washington’s 294th birthday, and in honor of that event and as part of my duties as the host of Historians At The Movies Podcast, I’d love to to rewatch my favorite movie about the First President. There’s just one problem: there really isn’t one.
Despite his prominent place in both American history and American memory, George Washington has remained elusive on the big screen. He was featured in a few silent films in the early twentieth century but afterwards tended to by a side character in other stories in the 1930s and 1940s. Perhaps the closest we got was Jeff Daniels’ performance in A&E’s The Crossing and some Barry Bostwick appearances in the 80s, but let’s face it, made for TV isn’t quite the same thing.
And it turns out that Washington is not the only American President struggling to find time on the silver screen or in a miniseries. While biopics of Abraham Lincoln (one including vampires), Harry S Truman, John Adams, Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, and Donald Trump all received attention in the last twenty-five years, even presidents with larger than life personas such as Theodore Roosevelt and Andrew Jackson have been missing from the comfort of our living room couches. This is perhaps even more surprising given the immensely popular fictional portrayal of presidents in movies and shows such as The American President, Dave, The West Wing, Air Force One, Designated Survivor, House of Cards, and even Battlestar Galactica. Presidents are an important part of pop culture, even if real ones don’t always make appearances. So why not George Washington? Should he not be first in our hearts, first in our minds, and first on the call sheet? I think there are a few things at play here.
First is that I think that George Washington has been almost literally deified in American discourse. The man is at this point a god who can create entire nations through his efforts. This is for good reason. Every civilization creates its own mythology that helps shape how its citizens view themselves and conduct their affairs. Think about the first thing you ever learned about Washington. The cherry tree story. Did it happen? Hard to say. Probably not but possibly rooted in some kernel of truth. In either case, it tells us that the father of country (and perhaps the father of ourselves as Americans) was honest, dutiful, and an obedient child of his father. He later reappears as a headstrong young officer who may have accidentally caused the Seven Years War…which led to the American Revolution. Later, leading his men across the Delaware and victories beyond, Washington is the first action hero in American history. The most important things Washington ever did were to step down from power, twice. In the current age, that is sadly almost unfathomable. So there is a question that perhaps the man might be too much to tackle onscreen.
There’s the practical reality of actually making a movie to consider here too. There is almost certainly the question of production values. Studios are businesses and plan on making profits in order to keep developing films. Period pieces are notoriously expensive. That doesn't mean they won’t work. Starz bankrolled Black Sails and Outlander to tremendous success. Shōgun showed recently just how successful well-scripted series can perform for viewers and critics alike. So I think with the right storyline and the right budget, a Washington movie or series might find profit.
But we have to talk about slavery. There is no getting around it. George Washington owned other human beings as chattel property. It is part of his and America’s story. Audiences—whether in a theater or at water coolers today—continue to struggle with the fact that many of America’s founding generation either held African Americans in bondage or supported the practice. Seeing Washington as a slaver complicates the nobility of his story. His inhumanity towards others somehow deflates his position above the rest of his countrymen. And filmmakers count on happy endings. How can a biopic of an enslaver feature a happy ending? Mel Gibson famously danced around this with The Patriot, as all of the Black farmers and carpenters on his plantation were free and chose to be there of their own volition. In South Carolina. In 1775. You might be able to get away with that with the portrayal of a man based on Francis Marion, but the big man himself? No chance, especially when any film or series would have to include William Lee, Washington’s enslaved valet who was also known to be one of the finest horsemen of his generation. George Washington’s relationship to enslaved Africans complicates his film and it should. But that is all the more reason to produce a biopic of the man who would not be king, perhaps all the more relevant in light of recent events.
But a well made film about George Washington, whether it focused on the American Revolution, his relationship with Martha, or his time as the first American President could be a critically important piece of dialogue about America’s past, where we are now, and where we envision ourselves in the future. We have seven years until Washington’s 300th birthday. It is time to revisit his story and that of America’s birth—as complicated as it is—on the big screen.
Washington the Delaware Podcast
I asked my friend and Washington scholar Dr. Craig Bruce Smith to sit in with me on an emergency podcast to talk about Washington on the big screen, why we haven’t seen him, and exactly who we’d cast as the first Commander in Chief. As always when Craig shows up, it was a tremendous conversation and a blast. So if you want to check that out or subscribe, you can below.
And if you’d like to learn more about George Washington on the man’s birthday, make sure to check out Craig’s book, American Honor: The Creation of the Nation’s Ideals during the Revolutionary War, which you can get from the UNC Press website for 30% off if you use the code 01HATM30 (I don’t get anything from this).
Ok, today is Saturday. Have yourself a great weekend and thanks for reading this and thanks for being part of this community.
Jason