'Young Sheldon' says goodbye, but Georgie begins a new run

Montana Jordan had no idea a spot on “Young Sheldon” would lead to a series of his own.

But the Texas native — who plays Sheldon’s brother Georgie — says the spinoff is a blessing and way to keep his TV family intact.

“The Georgie and Mandy storyline has a lot more to be told,” Jordan says. “Everybody knows that, but we’ll see where it goes.”

The series is slated to air this fall.

When he landed in “Sheldon,” Jordan and others weren’t certain where that “Big Bang Theory” spinoff was headed.

“It was an opportunity to explore how (Sheldon) affects this family around him and how the family affects him,” says executive producer Chuck Lorre. “It was almost immediately an ensemble show.”

Key to “Sheldon’s” success was finding a young actor who could play a younger version of Jim Parsons. Lorre put the call out and Iain Armitage’s mom sent a tape.

“We wrote the most difficult scene imaginable for an 8-year-old and this guy just killed it,” Lorre says. “If that had not happened, we wouldn’t have gone forward.” With the title character in place, it was just a matter of building an ensemble around him.

Jordan — who really does have a thick Southern accent — was cast as brother Georgie and now, “I’m blessed for everything that has been given me.”

To retain the accent, “I go straight back to Texas, and I can get it all back," he says. "It comes back real fast.”

As audiences warmed to Georgie, his part expanded. Now, in “Sheldon’s” seventh and final season, he’s juggling family, marriage and work. In the fifth season, Emily Osment joined the series as his love interest, Mandy.

“I was just offered one episode on ‘Young Sheldon’ and it grew so much from there,” Osment says. “I walked into my trailer one day and there was a big belly in there. I’m so grateful to see the arc of Mandy sort of becoming such a staunch feminist, standing up for herself, not wanted to take the Cooper name and wanting to be her own person.”

Back to homepage

Subscriber Login

Keep reading with a digital access subscription.

Subscribe now

The new series, Jordan says, will look at the struggles of a young couple and how the family “kind of pushes back on it. It just makes it a little bit harder for him to get through it.”

Fans of “Big Bang” may remember Georgie becomes Dr. Tire, the head of a tire chain. In the new series, however, he’s just starting his career at a local store.

The final episodes of “Young Sheldon” will help launch the Georgie and Mandy spinoff while Sheldon heads off to graduate school.

If some of the crew members from that show join the new series, Jordan will be thrilled.

“Everybody is so down-to-earth and great to work with,” he says. “You’re excited when you wake up and come to a place like this.”

For Armitage, who’s now 15 and almost as tall as Jim Parsons, “Young Sheldon” has been a great launching pad and, likely, the first of many acting projects. When he started the series at 8, he told producers he wanted to be a magician. Since then, he has continued to perform tricks but believes acting is his future.

“My dad is an actor as well but, if anything, I’ve never been pushed in any direction, certainly not career-wise,” Armitage says. “I’ve always felt very free to pursue what I’m interested in.”

Now as “Young Sheldon” nears the end of its run, both Armitage and Jordan say they couldn’t imagine a better “starter” project.

“It’s safe to say it was love at first sight for everybody,” the 21-year-old Jordan says.

For Lorre, who also served as executive producer of “Big Bang,” “Sheldon” has been a series that doesn’t pander.

“You do what feels right,” he says. “You do stuff that touches yourself and then you hope someone agrees with you. To assume we know what the audience wants is ridiculous. It’s best to do the things that we believe and just trust.”

A visit to the set of "Young Sheldon"