Cultural depictions of George Washington

File:WashingtonPeale.jpg

Washington at Princeton,
by Charles Willson Peale, 1779

George Washington has inspired artistic and cultural works for more than two hundred years. The following lists cover various media to include items of historic interest, enduring works of high art, and recent representations in popular culture. The entries represent portrayals that a reader has a reasonable chance of encountering rather than a complete catalog. Lesser known works are not included.

For purposes of classification, popular culture music is a separate section from operas and oratorios. Television covers live action series, TV movies, miniseries, and North American animation but not Japanese anime, which appears with manga and graphic novels.

Art

Washington is among the historical figures depicted in Our Nation's 200th Birthday, The Telephone's 100th Birthday (1976) by Stanley Meltzoff for Bell System.

Gallery

• A ca. 1810–1815 French Empire mantel clock, portraying George Washington. In the drapery swag under the dial can be read the famous quote by Henry Lee.
  A ca. 1810–1815 French Empire mantel clock, portraying George Washington. In the drapery swag under the dial can be read the famous quote by Henry Lee.
• The United States one-dollar bill has George Washington's face on it.
  The United States one-dollar bill has George Washington's face on it.
• The statue of Washington outside Federal Hall National Memorial, facing Wall Street and the New York Stock Exchange Building in New York City.
  The statue of Washington outside Federal Hall National Memorial, facing Wall Street and the New York Stock Exchange Building in New York City.
• Construction on the George Washington portrait at Mount Rushmore, c. 1932.
  Construction on the George Washington portrait at Mount Rushmore, c. 1932.
• Quarter with profile of Washington bust. He faces left regally and wears a colonial-style queue in his hair. "UNITED STATES OF AMERICA" is at top, "QUARTER DOLLAR" at bottom, "LIBERTY" at left, and "IN GOD WE TRUST" above "P" at right. Just below the bust is "JF uc" in tiny letters.
  Quarter with profile of Washington bust. He faces left regally and wears a colonial-style queue in his hair. "UNITED STATES OF AMERICA" is at top, "QUARTER DOLLAR" at bottom, "LIBERTY" at left, and "IN GOD WE TRUST" above "P" at right. Just below the bust is "JF uc" in tiny letters.

Documentaries

Date	Title	Portrayer	Country	Notes	IMDB
1994	The American Revolution	Cliff Robertson	USA	Voice role	[1]
2002	Founding Brothers	Brian Dennehy	USA	Voice role	[2]
2007	Searching for George Washington	Martin Sheen	USA	Voice role
2007	Alexander Hamilton	Richard Easton	USA	Voice role	[3]

Films

Date	Title	Portrayer	Country	Notes	IMDB	Ref.
1909	Washington Under the American Flag	Joseph Kilgour	USA	Directed by J. Stuart Blackton	[4]
1909	Washington Under the British Flag				[5]
1915	The Battle Cry of Peace			Directed by J. Stuart Blackton and Wilfrid North	[6]
1916	The Dawn of Freedom			Directed by Theodore Marston and Paul Scardon	[7]
1917	The Spirit of '76	William Beery		Directed by Frank Montgomery	[8]
1924	Yorktown	George Nash		Black and white silent film directed by Webster Campbell	[9]
1924	America	Arthur Dewey		Directed by D.W. Griffith	[10]
1927	The Flag	Francis X. Bushman		Directed by Arthur Maude	[11]
1931	Alexander Hamilton	Alan Mowbray		Directed by John G. Adolfi	[12]
1932	The Phantom President	Alan Mowbray		Directed by Norman Taurog	[13]
1936	Give Me Liberty	Robert Warwick		Directed by B. Reeves Eason
1939	Sons of Liberty	Montagu Love		Directed by Michael Curtiz	[14]
1940	The Howards of Virginia	George Houston		Directed by Frank Lloyd	[15]
1942	The Remarkable Andrew	Montagu Love		Directed by Stuart Heisler	[16]
1945	Where Do We Go from Here?	Alan Mowbray		Directed by Gregory Ratoff	[17]
1946	Monsieur Beaucaire	Douglass Dumbrille		Directed by George Marshall	[18]
1947	Unconquered	Richard Gaines		Directed by Cecil B. DeMille	[19]
1951	When the Redskins Rode	James Seay		Directed by Lew Landers	[20]
1959	John Paul Jones	John Crawford	USA / Spain	Directed by John Farrow	[21]
1961	La Fayette	Howard St. John	France / Italy	Directed by Jean Dréville	[22]
1976	Independence	Patrick O'Neal	USA	Directed by John Huston	[23]
2000	The Patriot	Terry Layman		Directed by Roland Emmerich	[24]
2006	We Fight to Be Free	Sebastian Roché	USA	Directed by Kees Van Oostrum	[25]
2008	An American Carol	Jon Voight	USA	Directed by David Zucker	[26]
2014	Mr. Peabody & Sherman	Jess Harnell	USA	Directed by Rob Minkoff	[27]
2015	Beyond the Mask	John Arden McClure	USA	Directed by Chad Burns	[28]
2021	America: The Motion Picture	Channing Tatum	USA	Directed by Matt Thompson	[29]
	The General		USA		[30]
	The Virginian		USA	Directed by Jason Hall	[31]

Television

Date	Title	Portrayer	Country	Notes	IMDB
1952	Hallmark Hall of Fame The Plot to Kidnap George Washington	Tod Griffin	USA		[32]
1955	You Are There Washington Crosses the Delaware (December 25, 1776) CBS	Russ Conway	USA		[33] [34]
1972	Bewitched George Washington Zapped Here (Parts 1 and 2)	Will Geer	USA		[35] [36]
1975	The Muppet Show: Sex and Violence	Jim Henson	USA	Featured a Muppet version of George Washington	[37]
1989	A Little Bit Strange	—	USA/Canada		[38]
1998–2001	Histeria!	—	USA	Featured a caricature of Washington modeled after Bob Hope as an occasional guest host.	[39]
1999	Celebrity DeathMatch	—	USA	Faced-off against Abraham Lincoln
2007	Masters of Horror "The Washingtonians"	—	USA	Washington is portrayed as a cannibal in a fictional account of alternate history.
2011	Deadliest Warrior	Nick Schroeder (young)	USA	In the third-season premiere, Washington battled Napoleon.	[40]
2013–2014	Sleepy Hollow	Louis Herthum	USA		[41]
2014	Epic Rap Battles of History	Peter Shukoff	USA	YouTube web series; episode "George Washington vs. William Wallace".	[42]
2014	Ben 10: Omniverse	David Kaye	USA	Voice role	[43]
2014–2017	Turn: Washington's Spies	Ian Kahn	USA		[44]
2015	Turn: Washington's Spies	Bryan Adrian	USA		[45]
2016	Timeless	Damian O'Hare	USA		[46]
2017	Legends of Tomorrow	Randall Batinkoff	USA	Two episodes	[47]
2018	Outlander	Simon Harrison	Scotland/USA	Episode "Wilmington"

Television movies

Date	Title	Portrayer	Country	Notes	IMDB	Ref.
1975	Valley Forge	Richard Basehart	USA	TV movie directed by Fielder Cook	[48]
1976	The Patriots	Ralph Clanton	USA	TV movie directed by Bob Hankal and Robert Strane	[49]
1979	The Rebels	Peter Graves	USA	TV movie directed by Russ Mayberry	[50]
1992	1775	Adam West	USA	TV movie directed by David Trainer	[51]
2000	The Crossing	Jeff Daniels	USA	TV movie directed by Robert Harmonstarring	[52]
2003	Benedict Arnold: A Question of Honor	Kelsey Grammer	USA	TV movie directed by Mikael Salomon	[53]

Miniseries

Date	Title	Portrayer	Country	Notes	IMDB
1984	George Washington	Barry Bostwick	USA	TV miniseries directed by Buzz Kulik	[54]
1986	George Washington II: The Forging of a Nation	Barry Bostwick	USA	TV miniseries directed by William A. Graham	[55]
1997	LIBERTY! The American Revolution	Stephen Lang (voice)	USA	TV miniseries directed by Ellen Hovde and Muffie Meyer	[56]
2000	Founding Fathers	Brian Dennehy (voice)	USA	TV miniseries directed by Mark Hufnail and Melissa Jo Peltier	[57]
2000	The American President	Walter Cronkite (voice)	USA	TV miniseries directed by Philip Kunhardt III, Philip Kunhardt Jr., Peter W. Kunhardt, and James A. Edgar	[58]
2002	Liberty's Kids	Michael Santo (voice)	USA	TV animated series
2006	Washington the Warrior	Jackson Bolt, Shea Patrick (young)	USA	TV miniseries directed by Robert M. Wise	[59]
2006	The War That Made America	Larry Nehring	USA	TV miniseries directed by Ben Loeterman and Eric Stange	[60]
2008	John Adams	David Morse	USA	TV miniseries directed by Tom Hooper starring David Morse as Washington	[61]
2015	Sons of Liberty	Jason O'Mara	USA	TV miniseries	[62]
2020	Washington	Nicholas Rowe	USA	TV miniseries	[63]

Theatre

Date	Title	Original portrayer	Country	Notes	IMDB
1920	George Washington	Walter Hampden	USA	Ran for 16 performances
2015	Hamilton	Christopher Jackson	USA	Musical based on the life of Alexander Hamilton, written by Lin Manuel-Miranda. Washington features as a main character in the musical. A digital recording of the musical is available on Disney+.

Video games

George Washington is featured in modern video games as a prominent fictionalized character from world history in Age of Empires III, Civilization V and Assassin's Creed III (as himself in game and a counter-history King in DLC). These games are discussed in Winnerling and Kershbaumer's Early Modernity and Video Games explaining that the player manipulating the games' semiotic system of communications thereby "gives insights in his historical consciousness."

Date	Title	Portrayer	Country	Notes	IMDB	Ref.
1991	Bill & Ted's Excellent Video Game Adventure	—	USA	One of the historical figures that must be retrieved within the game.
1993	Day of the Tentacle	—	USA	A character that travels to the past meets George Washington, and among other things, "converts" a kumquat tree to a cherry tree for George to cut down	[64]
1993	Mario's Time Machine	—	USA
1994	Liberty or Death	—	Japan, USA
2004	The Political Machine	—	USA
2005	Age of Empires III	Daniel Riordan	USA	Voice role	[65]
2005	Civilization IV	—	USA		[66]
2007	Age of Empires III: The WarChiefs	Daniel Riordan	USA	Voice role
2008	The Political Machine 2008	—	USA
2008	Civilization IV: Colonization	—	USA
2009	Scribblenauts	—	USA	Washington also appears in a similar fashion in all of the sequels to Scribblenauts.
2009	Empire: Total War	—	USA	Washington is a selectable general for the United States faction
2010	Civilization V	Marcel Jeanin	USA	Voice role	[67]
2012	The Political Machine 2012	—	USA
2012	Assassin's Creed III	Robin Atkin Downes	Canada	Voice role. The assassin ancestor Ratonhnhaké:ton interacts with Washington during the course of the American Revolution.	[68]
2012	Assassin's Creed III: The Tyranny of King Washington	Robin Atkin Downes	Canada	Voice role. Revolves around an alternative history, wherein Washington becomes corrupted by an ancient artifact, and dubs himself King.	[69]
2013	BioShock Infinite	—		Patriot robots are modeled after George Washington.	[70]
2014	Team Fortress 2	—	USA	George Washington is featured in a comic called A Cold Day in Hell.
2014	Second Chance Heroes	—	USA, Canada	George Washington is featured in a comic book introduction to the game.
2014	Assassin's Creed: Rogue	Tod Fennell	Bulgaria	Voice role. A young Washington briefly appears during a party for his half-brother, Lawrence.	[71]
2016	The Political Machine 2016	—	USA
2018	The Council	Christian Erickson	France	Voice role
2020	The Political Machine 2020	—	USA
2020	Age of Empires III: Definitive Edition	Daniel Riordan	USA	Voice role
2021	Funko Pop! Blitz		USA

Internet

Date	Title	Portrayer	Country	Notes	IMDB	Ref.
2014	Epic Rap Battles of History	Peter Shukoff	USA	Washington features in a rap battle against Scottish resistance leader William Wallace.

See also

• George Washington
• George Washington on U.S. postage stamps
  • Washington-Franklin postage stamps
• List of statues of George Washington
• Hamilton (2015 musical)
• Valley Forge play

Further reading

• Bergmann, Linda S. "Epic, Parody, and National Identity: George Washington in Nineteenth-Century American Humor." Studies in American Humor 2 (1995): 1-22. online
• Browne, Stephen Howard. The First Inauguration: George Washington and the Invention of the Republic (Penn State Press, 2020) on the inaugural address. online
• Bruggeman, Seth C. Here, George Washington was born: Memory, material culture, and the public history of a national monument (U of Georgia Press, 2011).
• Cavitch, Max. "The man that was used up: Poetry, particularity, and the politics of remembering George Washington." American Literature 75.2 (2003): 247-274. summary
• Greenhalgh, Adam. " 'Not a man but a god' the apotheosis of Gilbert Stuart’s Athenaeum portrait of George Washington." Winterthur Portfolio 41.4 (2007): 269-304. online
• Jacobs, Phoebe Lloyd. "John James Barralet and the Apotheosis of George Washington." Winterthur Portfolio 12 (1977): 115-137. online
• Marks, Arthur S. "The statue of King George III in New York and the iconology of regicide." American Art Journal 13.3 (1981): 61-82. online on tearing down statues
• Marling, Karal Ann. George Washington Slept Here: Colonial Revivals and American Culture, 1876-1986 (Harvard University Press, 1988).
• Mitnick, Barbara J., et al. George Washington: American Symbol (Hudson Hills, 1999).
• Savage, Kirk. "The self-made monument: George Washington and the fight to erect a national memorial." Winterthur Portfolio 22.4 (1987): 225-242. online
• Schwartz, Barry. "Social change and collective memory: The democratization of George Washington." American Sociological Review (1991): 221-236. online
• Tschachler, Heinz. George Washington and Political Fatherhood: The Endurance of a National Myth (McFarland, 2020) re "Father of his country" slogan.
• Young, Christopher J. "Memory by Consensus: Remembering the American Revolutionary War in Chicago." Journal of American Studies 50.4 (2016): 971-997. onlineTemplate:Cbignore

External links

• "Memory and Myth: George Washington in American Art" from Smithsonian
• "George Washington in American Art" Lesson plan for secondary schools, from Bill of Rights Institute