Hemingway's Picasso

After being released from prison in 1984, Steve tries his luck at getting a normal job. 

But when his past kept catching up with him, Mustafa Hamshaw, AKA Joe Pegg, gives him a chance of a lifetime. 

Steve meets a Miami Dolphins cheerleader, Patron, one night on the dance floor, and they elope quickly thereafter. 

After a whirlwind romance, a less-than-perfect marriage followed, and soon Steve would realize he might need to make one last, big run to try to get out of the game and save his family. 

This is a Somethin' Else production in association with Vespucci. 

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Who was Hugh Hefner? Liberator of sexuality, bizarre playboy or something more sinister? In this season, journalist and author Amy Rose Spiegel looks at his complex story through the eyes of the women who knew him best, delving into Hefner’s rise to power and investigating the dark side of the brand. What can the story of Hugh Hefner and the rise and fall of Playboy tell us about sex and power, then and now?

A Somethin' Else production.

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Steve deals with the consequences of his arrest from his drug run in Mexico. He moves to Miami to chase his dreams of football stardom, and ends up exploring what else the city has to offer. But then, he gets an angry call from his mother. 

Meanwhile, Steve’s daughter, Jamie, uncovers what it was like to have a father like Steve, the good and the bad. 

This is a Somethin' Else production in association with Vespucci. 

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During Steve’s short career on the football field he has a run in with his old buddies in the Detroit Mafia who lure him on his first trip across the border to Mexico. 

Steve’s son, Stevie reveals what life was like as the son of a drug smuggler in Miami. 

This is a Somethin' Else production in association with Vespucci. 

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Steve Kough was a lot of things: an ex-NFL player, model, drug smuggler, art aficionado, Miami’s heart-throb, and a father. His unfiltered and brazen thirst for excitement mixed with a family history of crime was a cocktail for a wild life. On a cocaine drug run to Cuba in 1989, Steve winds up with a Picasso ceramic tile that once belonged to Ernest Hemingway. The piece is apparently meant to go to Pablo Escobar in lieu of cash, but due to political complications in Cuba, Steve gets to keep the piece.

Steve’s son, Stevie now holds the treasured piece that represents all the incarnations of his father. The question is, do we believe the story?

This is a Somethin' Else production in association with Vespucci. 

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Steve Kough lived many lives. He was an NFL journeyman, a male model, and one of the most well-connected smugglers in 1980’s Miami, the “Drug Capital of the World."

Kough collected many souvenirs from his adventures, but his most treasured bounty – a beautiful ceramic, crafted by Pablo Picasso and gifted to Ernest Hemingway at the author’s Cuban home, the Finca Vigia... or so the story goes. Lost during the Cuban Revolution, the artwork resurfaced when Kough took it as a payment for drug run financed by the notorious Pablo Escobar. 

Kough passed away in 2018, passing the piece down to his son, Stevie, a skateboarding hippie growing weed in California. Stevie feels he needs to complete his father’s mission – of selling this piece and telling Steve’s cinematic life story. So, is the Picasso authentic—or a fraud? Was Steve Kough a big talker or a real deal smuggler? Does any of that matter or is this a story of aspiration, legacy, and difficult love? Tune in on Monday’s starting on October 18th to find out! 

This is a Somethin' Else production in association with Vespucci. 

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