Big news today for fans of this weekend\u2019s Angel Studios mini-hit\u00a0Young Washington, whose desperate need to find out if this young up-and-comer eventually evolves, Pok\u00e9mon-like, into\u00a0Old-Ass Washington, will finally be assuaged. Writer and director Jon Erwin has now confirmed that he\u2019s hard at work on a sequel, titled 1776 (but not the singing one), which will presumably get Washington through at least the year 1775. (Possibly further.)<\/p>\n
We are, in case it wasn\u2019t clear, pretty firmly in the Angel Studios Zone here: That area of semi-independent moviegoing where you look at a film marquee or list of box office results, go \u201cWhat the fuck is that?\u201d and then find out that some movie aimed directly at the most uncle-coded portions of America\u2019s heartland is making wild amounts of money right out of the corner of your eye. And while Young Washington\u00a0isn\u2019t clearing\u00a0Sound Of Freedom<\/a>\u00a0or \u201cThe Chosen\u00a0in theaters\u201d numbers, it\u00a0is\u00a0reportedly doing better than expected in its opening weekend<\/a>, to the tune of $18 million, and is actually predicted to beat Warner Bros.\u2019 Supergirl\u00a0in its second week in theaters.<\/p>\n As the title suggests, Erwin\u2019s film purports to do for Washingtons what\u00a0Young Sheldon\u00a0did for Sheldons, telling the story of the future first president up through the Battle Of The Monongahela in 1755. (Which means, somewhat ironically, that the big patriotic release of the 4th of July weekend is centered on a point in Washington\u2019s life where he was a proud and patriotic British militia officer.) The film stars William Franklyn-Miller as Washington himself, surrounded by \u201cbig-names-collecting-slightly-less-big-paycheck\u201d types like Ben Kingsley, Kelsey Grammer, Andy Serkis, and Mary-Louise Parker\u2014who, as Washington\u2019s mother, assures him that all his suffering is just part of God\u2019s big plan to ensure someone with a sufficiently distinctive haircut ends up on the one dollar bill.<\/p>\n