Everything Griselda’s Son Michael Corleone Blanco Has Said About the Netflix Series

Suing Netflix

Before the series dropped on Netflix on January 25, 2024, Michael and his wife, Marie, filed a lawsuit in Miami-Dade County Court against the streaming giant. Michael, along with Griselda’s estate, claimed that Netflix did not get permission to tell the drug queenpin’s life story and failed to give proper credit to her family.

The family’s lawyers dismissed the complaint with prejudice on February 9, confirming that the family’s claims will never make it to court again.

An Emotional Rollercoaster

“It’s a rush of emotions. It’s very surreal,” Michael told Cocaine Cowboys documentarian Billy Corben during his “The Real Griselda” podcast on February 6, 2024, about watching the miniseries. Billy did three more podcast episodes where Michael had so much more to say.

“I’m not going to lie to you; it was very emotional. There was a point where I found myself gasping for air. I found myself happy. I found myself sad,” he added

Not Enough

“I feel that the story, our story, my family’s story, the Blanco family’s universe, it’s so complex and so legendary it should be shown respect when it comes to storytelling. I think the story deserved a little more,” Michael said about Netflix’s Griselda.

His Beautiful Mother

“My mother was a beautiful woman … When you read my book, you’ll see that my mother was called the porcelain doll in her youth. Mayors, governors and politicians in different countries would try to court my mother … even here in the United States. She was the crème de la crème,” Michael said of his mother’s beauty. Sofía spent three hours in the makeup chair to have prosthetics and other makeup applied to transform into Griselda, which her son said made her look “more like a drug addict.”
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One Positive

“I liked that wherever my mother went, we went with her,” he said of himself and his older brothers, Uber, Dixon and Osvaldo. “So, I liked the fact that they tried to humanize the character. That was nice. That’s probably it.”

Got It Wrong

Michael was highly critical of how Griselda spent the first episode trying to sell a kilo of cocaine in Miami in 1978, as he noted she was already a major drug distributor by then.

He called that plot point “far from accurate,” saying, “It was quite embarrassing. The lady was the No. 1 cocaine distributor in the world by 1975. She created the industry.”

“You could say my mother was the first official whale because nobody had hundreds of kilos. Nobody had the laboratories. She pioneered the routes. She pioneered everything in the modern-day cocaine industry as we know it,” he added.

Griselda started distributing cocaine in New York, before relocating to Colombia to evade authorities in 1975. She proceeded to move to Miami, where she quickly took over the city’s drug trade.

Carmen the Travel Agent

When Griselda flees to Miami, she stays with a former friend from her earlier drug dealing days who got away from crime to run a travel agency. Michael said the character was “inspired by the actual person that was the one who was responsible for basically cosigning a lot of the crimes that my mother was indicted for. She was a very intricate part of the family, my mother’s close friend, and she survived and attempted murder, but not from my mother.”

Griselda Needed No One’s Permission

In the miniseries, Griselda needed permission from Rafael “Amilcar” Rodriguez to get a cocaine distribution up and running. Michael said that was “far from it.” He explained, “My mother, from the moment she stepped off the plane, within two weeks she was already controlling most of the market here in Miami. Within a matter of months, she was the No. 1 distributor here in Miami.”

Already Powerful

“My mother was not only loved by ​Medellín cocaine czars, but her best friend was Santa Cruz from the Cali cartel,” Michael said of how episode two got it wrong where she was desperately trying to sell 10 kilos of cocaine, ultimately tapping into rich white South Florida society. In other words, she had no problem getting and moving cocaine as she was friends with the top Colombian drug lords.

Pablo Escobar Really Was Afraid of Griselda

In the opening scene from the series, the quote, “The only man I was afraid of was a woman named Griselda Blanco,” is shown and attributed to Pablo Escobar. Michael said that is true. “I’ve been hearing it since I was young,” he told Billy.

Incorrect Story Timeline

“If you’re going to compress three decades into a series, 10 episodes would be ‘somewhat’ correct, or multiple seasons,” Michael said of how the writing team hoped for that number instead of the six that aired. He noted how the timeline of events as they occurred was very much off in the miniseries as a result of the limited storytelling time