The play “Amparo”, premiered in Miami in 2019 to tell the story of the Arechabala family, founders of Havana Club rum, now has a digital version on Instagram to reach “a wider audience” with a mix of still photos and videos between 30 to 60 seconds.
” The Amparo Experience “, the title of the series, with a total of 51 posts on Instagram, is based on the work of “immersion theater” in which the viewer was able to travel with all five senses the Cuba of the last 62 years without moving from an old house in Miami, and that can now be seen on the internet.
Cuban-Americans Vanessa García and Victoria Collado, author, and director of “Amparo”, respectively, are the architects of one of the first experiences in Miami of a type of theater in which the spectator is an essential part of the performance.
They also sign the adaptation to the Instagram series.
“The impulse to tell this story has always been to go as far as possible. To go to the roots and to the future, so to speak,” Garcia said in a statement.
“This platform that we use now allows us to do it. Anyone can connect to this story, which is part of what it is about. We are all connected,” added the writer of The Amparo Experience.
The digital version of “Amparo”, which was shot over 10 days in five different locations in Miami, shows the story of the marriage of Amparo and Ramón Arechabala, heirs to the famous rum formula that their great-great-grandfather, José Arechabala, created in 1878 in the city of Cárdenas, Matanzas, a province bordering the Cuban capital.
In the first person, Amparo’s character takes viewers through her courtship relationship with Ramón, the effects the revolution had on their family and businesses, and how they came out “on the other side,” the statement says.
Ramón Arechabala, who was in jail after the expropriation, arrived in Miami in 1966 with the recipe for Havana Club rum, which had been registered since 1934 and was served in a famous place of the same name opened in the Plaza de la Catedral in Havana. in 1936.
Many years later, he sold the rights and the recipe to Bacardi, another Cuban family in the rum sector that had to leave Cuba, although in this case, it was able to continue producing from other countries.
The work accompanies the lives of Ramón, who died in 2010, Amparo and her family to this day.
“We will continue to tell this story in any medium and in all possible ways so that the world finally knows the truth,” said the director of The Amparo Experience, Victoria Collado.
“This story is alive and breathing. It is still looking for its resolution. One that we hope will be on the side of true justice…” added Collado.
As part of its “long-term” commitment to the Center for a Free Cuba, The Real Havana Club will donate one dollar for each fan earned on @TheAmparoExperience up to $25,000.
This organization, say the show’s producers, “provides benefits to the Cuban people by supporting the activities of dissident organizations within Cuba.