EXCLUSIVE - The truth behind Sean Penn’s ‘bungle in the jungle’: Director Oliver Stone orchestrated rendezvous with El Chapo to make a Hollywood blockbuster starring the Oscar-winning actor as the drug lord
- Sean Penn, 55, claimed he pursued meeting for Rolling Stone magazine
- A new documentary reveals the rendezvous was to discuss movie deal
- Stone was willing to pay $6million for El Chapo's life rights, source claims
- Penn's mystery accomplices were identified as two Argentinian movie producers who have worked extensively with Stone
- Actor allegedly used his seven hours with the drug lord studying the man he hoped to portray
- See more news on El Chapo at www.dailymail.co.uk/elchapo
Sean Penn’s notorious meeting with El Chapo was orchestrated by director Oliver Stone, who wanted to buy the rights to the druglord’s life for a mere $6million and make a Hollywood blockbuster starring the Oscar-winner, a new documentary will reveal.
In his widely lampooned article for Rolling Stone, Penn claimed he pursued a rendezvous with Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzman – the most wanted and dangerous drug lord in the world – purely for journalistic purposes.
The leader of the Sinaloa cartel had ostensibly granted his first and only interview after escaping from a maximum security prison through a tunnel months earlier to the 55-year-old actor.
But a new one-hour documentary claims the truth behind the encounter is more tangled than the script it was meant to lead to.
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Sean Penn’s notorious meeting with El Chapo (pictured together, above) was orchestrated by director Oliver Stone, who wanted to make a Hollywood blockbuster about the druglord starring the Oscar-winner, a new documentary will reveal
Oliver Stone (left) was willing to pay $6million for the rights to El Chapo's life. Actress Kate del Castillo claimed she was blindsided by Penn's article for Rolling Stone
A new documentary, called ‘El Chapo & Sean Penn: Bungle in the Jungle’, reveals El Chapo granted Penn the secret meeting to discuss the possibility of immortalizing the drug kingpin on the silver screen.
The diminutive drug lord, known as 'Shorty' because he is only 5′ 6″, wanted Hollywood to make him bigger than Pablo Escobar and Scarface - and Penn, at 5′ 8″, was to play him.
While on the run, he is said to have watched recent Netflix hit Narcos, about his Colombian counterpart, and wanted to be similarly revered.
Chris Brancato, Narcos co-creator and producer, tells the documentary: 'I spoke with a friend of mine whose one of the people whose life rights we had for Narcos and he's involved with the DEA and he said El Chapo saw Narcos while on the run.
'Obviously these guys have access to computers and quite honestly, probably had quite a lot of time on his hands, with half the country looking for him.'
And a source close to Stone revealed to the documentary makers that the top Hollywood director was willing to pay $6million for the rights to El Chapo’s life.
And although Penn took great pains to conceal the identities of two mysterious men who accompanied him and Mexican actress Kate del Castillo to the jungle – referring to them only as ‘Espinoza’ and ‘El Alto’ – the documentary exposes them as Argentinian movie producers Fernando Sulichin and Jose Ibanez.
Both have worked often within Stone – on films including Alexander, South of the Border, Savages and the upcoming Snowden, as well as the Showtime series The Untold History of The United States.
The documentary reveals Argentinian movie producers Fernando Sulichin (pictured left) and Jose Ibanez (right) were the mystery men who accompanied Sean Penn and Kate del Castillo to the meeting with El Chapo
Del Castillo, who played a drug boss of Mexican telenovela ‘La Reina del Sur’ - first contacted Sulichin with the hope of forming a Hollywood ‘dream team’ to make a film about El Chapo’s life, according the documentary.
She also reportedly wanted him to invest in her fledgling tequila brand ‘Honor’.
The producers accompanied Penn and del Castillo on a private jet from Van Nuys airport to Guadalajara in October last year.
Penn – whose relationship with Stone dates back to 1997 – tagged along for the meeting and used the opportunity to study the man he hoped to portray on screen, it is claimed.
The actor spent seven hours with El Chapo drinking and eating – and took no notes.
Sharon Waxman, editor-in-chief of The Wrap, says in the documentary: ‘At the end of the day he sat there with a fugitive drug lord for seven hours and didn’t interview him.
‘They sat around and drank beers and ate tacos. The whole thing is very much through the looking glass.’
Raquel ‘Queen of Bail’, a bondswoman who deals with celebrities and drug cartel members alike, added: ‘The meeting may not have helped his Rolling Stone article, but I’m sure it helped him as an actor tremendously – how he walks, how he talks.
‘Seven hours of somebody, I’m sure, is a great study.’
Penn was criticized for meeting El Chapo in October last year without alerting Mexican authorities. Pictured, a man reads Penn's article for Rolling Stone
Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman, pictured in a hotel in the city of Los Mochis, Mexico, after he was recaptured on January 8 after escaping prison in July last year
Penn’s Rolling Stone piece – titled ‘El Chapo Speaks’ – describes his time with the drug lord in mind-numbing and excruciating detail.
The questions El Chapo ultimately answers were ultimately submitted via text messages and the responses sent to Penn on video without the actor present.
And Penn even submitted the piece in its entirely to El Chapo for approval prior to publication.
And just a day before Penn’s article was published, El Chapo was recaptured in Los Mochis in January after escaping a safe house through a sewer tunnel.
He is now back in the very same maximum security prison he escaped from last year and fighting extradition to the United States.
Both Penn and del Castillo were criticized for meeting the drug lord without alerting any authorities.
Authorities later said the actor's encounter led them to the fugitive. Pictured, Mexican army soldiers escort the drug lord to a helicopter to be transported to a maximum security prison after his recapture
But Mexican officials later said that the ill-fated meeting with the cartel leader, who the FBI claim is responsible for 70,000 deaths - led to his capture.
And in the aftermath of El Chapo’s capture, del Castillo claimed she felt ‘betrayed’ by Penn and was blindsided by his Rolling Stone article.
She says the piece exposed her to the vengeance not only of El Chapo’s cartel, but Mexican authorities, who want to question her about her relationship and involvement with Guzman.
Vance Owen, an attorney, film produce and friend of del Castillo’s, said: ‘Perhaps Sean was advised by his lawyer to say, 'Look man, you better run out and write an article by Rolling Stone for this thing so you can be protected under the first amendment freedom of press because the freedom of the press protects interviews like this.'
‘El Chapo & Sean Penn: Bungle in the Jungle’, a new one-hour documentary, premieres March 10 on the Reelz Channel and 9pm EST and 6pm and 8pm PST.
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