Andrew Erwin is one half of the filmmaking duo known as “the Erwin brothers”. He and his brother Jon got their start co-directing Christian music videos and “faith-based” films like October Baby, Moms’ Night Out, and Woodlawn, and in 2018 they had a huge success with I Can Only Imagine, a biopic of MercyMe front man Bart Millard that became one of the biggest “faith-based” hits of all time.
The success of that film allowed the Erwins to start their own studio, Kingdom Story Company, and to set up a production deal with Lionsgate, the company behind the Hunger Games and John Wick franchises. Andrew and his brother co-directed the first two films made under that deal—2020’s I Still Believe and 2021’s American Underdog—but since then, they’ve gone in slightly different directions.
Jon has continued as a director on films like 2023’s Jesus Revolution and TV shows like the epic-biblical House of David, the latter of which he is making for Amazon through a brand new company he co-founded called The Wonder Project.
But Andrew has worked primarily as a producer on Kingdom Story films like Jesus Revolution, Ordinary Angels, Unsung Hero and, now, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, an adaptation of the 1972 Barbara Robinson novel that is now playing in theatres. He also recently became a podcaster, as the host of Kingdom Story’s The Storytellers.
I had a chance to speak to Andrew before his studio’s latest film, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, came out this week, and you can watch or listen to our chat above.
Some of the main points we covered include:
The first five years of Kingdom Story’s Lionsgate partnership (0:16).
The effect of the Covid pandemic on the “faith-based” genre (1:37).
Why The Best Christmas Pageant Ever is coming out in early November (4:17).
How The Chosen director Dallas Jenkins brought The Best Christmas Pageant Ever to Kingdom Story Company (5:18).
“Sharing resources” with other Christian filmmakers (7:22).
How Kingdom Story balances “secular” and/or “faith-based” content (9:29).
Whether Kingdom Story will adapt any of the The Best Christmas Pageant Ever’s sequels—like, say, The Best Halloween Ever (13:21).
The different focuses of Kingdom Story and The Wonder Project (14:02).
A status report on Apostles: Resurrection of Christ (16:20).
For background, here are some links to a few of the things we discussed:
My interview with Andrew’s brother Jon (Mar 2018).
The press release announcing Kingdom Story’s Lionsgate deal (Mar 2019).
IndieWire’s review of Ordinary Angels (Feb 2024).
A recent post of mine on the box-office performance of “faith-based” films pre- and post-Covid (Aug 2024).
The Chosen’s expanding “universe” (Sep 2024).
Erwin’s podcast interview with Dallas Jenkins (YouTube/Spotify) (Oct 2024).
I also need to correct, or at least qualify, one comment I made:
Around the 4-minute mark, I say that 2018’s The Grinch, “as animated films go… didn’t have the biggest opening, but it certainly legged it out.” The Grinch, which opened in the second week of November (just like The Best Christmas Pageant Ever), actually had one of the top 25 openings of any animated movie ever at that time—but it stayed strong all the way to New Year’s Day and went on to gross more than four times what it opened to, which is an unusually strong multiple. So my basic point still stands, I think, about the potential longevity of Christmas films that come out so early.1
You can watch a featurette about The Best Christmas Pageant Ever here:
And you can watch a trailer for the film here:
My memory of that film’s trajectory may have been affected by films like Migration and Puss in Boots: The Last Wish that had small-ish openings in December and went on to gross ten or even fifteen times those opening-weekend amounts.
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