Secuoya Studios and Arrivelo Productions announced the development of the first television series to showcase the legacy of family-owned Bacardi. The production draws inspiration from true events documented in The Bacardi Archives – a private collection, managed by the Bacardi company. The story is one of ambition, adversity and family that begins with founder Don Facundo Bacardí Massó and his vision to create the world’s first light-bodied rum. The series will narrate how the company persevered from its humble beginnings in Cuba in the 1800s through countless hardships, political turmoil, economic crisis, and forced exile from its homeland, to become a global spirits empire.
Leading the production will be Showrunner and Director Jonathan Jakubowicz (“Resistance,” “Hands of Stone,” “Secuestro Express”). Soon, the international cast and the rest of the production team for this large-scale project will be announced.
Brendan Fitzgerald, CEO of Secuoya Studios, stated: “We are delighted to partner with Arrivelo Productions in this production to bring the exciting story of the Bacardi saga to screens worldwide. This incredible tale deserves to be told, and we are confident that its generational history of struggle and passion will captivate the audience.”
The Bacardi company was founded in 1862 in Cuba and remains family owned after more than 160 years and seven generations. Today, it is the world’s largest privately held international spirits company with a portfolio of more than 200 brands and labels.
Showrunner and Director Jonathan Jakubowicz added: “For the past two centuries, the Bacardi company has played a role in the events shaping the Cuban history, while also leading one of the greatest entrepreneurial stories of all time. It’s a true honor to bring this never-before-heard story to life with the help of its protagonists, who have graciously opened their archives to us. I have always dreamed of creating an epic that captures the complex history of Latin America and its relationship with the United States and Europe.”
In words of Andrés Arriaga, CEO of Arrivelo Productions, “The gratitude of all the people at Arrivelo Productions is, and will always be, infinite to Bacardi for having trusted our company to share their story with people around the world, a story that, aside of its great business achievements, conveys humility, resilience and, above all, an exemplary behavior in the history of Cuba. This undertaking is only possible thanks to the support of a production company at the level needed to handle a project of such magnitude, Secuoya Studios, and its executive producer, David Martínez, who from the first moment fell in love with this great story like we did.”
The television series by Secuoya Studios and Arrivelo Productions, in consultation with the Bacardi company, will tell a story parallel to political revolutions, economic crises, pioneering expansion, social changes, women’s emancipation, commercial disputes, Theodore Roosevelt’s presidency, and the betrayals of Cuban revolutionaries, which forced many into exile. The series will feature talent from different nationalities and will be shot in both English and Spanish.