'It Was Worse In Real Life': The Inspirations For Netflix's ‘Narcos’ On Pablo Escobar’s Reign

Our growing fascination with true crime raises many questions, with some concerned about glamourising crime and glorifying criminals.

Those are two of the reasons why former DEA agents Steve Murphy and Javier Pena, the duo who were instrumental in taking down Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar, knocked back two separate filmmakers over the years who wanted to tell their story.

“Those two guys had personal agendas and we just didn't want anything to do with it,” Murphy tells from his home in Washington. “They didn't really care about telling the truth, and that's when Javier and I became really convinced that nobody cared about the story.”

But someone did care – producer Eric Newman, the man behind critically acclaimed Netflix series Narcos.

When he first reached out Murphy and Pena, their knee-jerk reaction was to politely decline the offer, but Newman was persistent and organised to meet them in Washington for dinner.

“When we met in person, our personalities clicked,” Murphy recalls. “So, at the end of the evening, after dinner, he said, ‘What are you going to do?’ And we said, ‘Well, we're going to discuss this and our suggestion is we move forward and let's just see what happens.’

“As we were getting ready to walk out the door, he said, ‘Let me ask you one more question - why are you guys so hesitant to do anything with this story?’

“And both of us agreed that our biggest concern has always been that someone would try to glamorise a guy like Pablo Escobar who is nothing more than a mass murderer. This guy is responsible for tens of thousands of murders, some were enemies, some were competition, some were innocent people who happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time.

“There was a car bomb he set off one time at a shopping mall where mothers had their school-aged children there shopping for school supplies, and you've got these mums and their kids that are dismembered and the carnage was just horrific when you get down and see that. These are things that you remember for the rest of your life.”

Narcos does paint a fairly harrowing picture of Escobar’s reign, but, as Pena adds, joining the conversation from his home in Texas, “It was worse in real life.

“One of the reasons we do our [live] show is to basically talk about the real history, what really happened. There's a lot of false stuff out there. There are people that still don't believe some of the terrorism that happened.”

As expected, there were times when Narcos' writers took creative licence, including with certain aspects of our protagonists, played on screen by Boyd Holbrook (Logan, Gone Girl) who portrayed Murphy, and Pedro Pascal, who played Peña and you might know as Oberyn Martell from Game of Thrones, among other roles.

“I have more women on the show, I'm a dirty DA,” Pena laughs. “That's the furthest thing from the truth, but it's ok.”

Another big difference is the iconic rooftop chase scene, during which Escobar was shot and killed. Who fired the fatal shot has never been determined, but there’s no way it could have been Murphy, something viewers may find surprising.

“Narcos portrays that I was on the roof when Pablo was killed – that’s not true,” Murphy says. “I was back at the police base, the Columbian National Police were the only ones out there and they took care of business.

“We were completely shocked by the popularity of this because we honestly didn't think anybody ever wanted to hear this story."

“Back at the base, you’re thinking, ‘Could this really be over? Is this really true?’ And then when you get out there and see what’s taken place, you realise that it is. It was a great feeling of elation; the weight of the world had been lifted off your shoulders and you knew that thousands of people were safer now, simply because Pablo was gone.”

There were a number of nail-biting close calls for viewers for Escobar throughout Narcos, and given the brilliant portrayal of the drug lord by Brazilian actor Wagner Moura, it’s hard not to sympathise or root for his onscreen representation from time to time.

“You know, you're exactly right,” Murphy says. “I'm sitting there watching the show with my wife and all of a sudden, I start feeling sorry for Pablo. Then it hits me, ‘Wait, wait, you're the main DEA guy! You can't feel sorry for this guy. He's a mass murderer, he's a narcos terrorist.’ But that's how good an actor Wagner Moura is. I mean, he even had me feeling sorry for Pablo, so I know what you talk about when you say you kind of side with the guy there for a while.”

Neither of them was expecting the story to resonate as much as it did and become a worldwide phenomenon that would allow them to tour the world with their A Conversation On Narcos stage show.

“We were completely shocked by the popularity of this because we honestly didn't think anybody ever wanted to hear this story,” Murphy says. “It was so old. When we came out of Columbia, some people knew what we'd done, some people didn't. It's not something you bring up in a conversation, but it's always been, if people ask us questions, we would answer them.

“But honestly, there's nobody more surprised than Javier and I about the popularity of this whole show."

Pena adds: “People are captivated by basically, how did Pablo Escobar get away with what he did and we also see how he challenged his country and actually won. So, it's a fascinating story.”