HOW TO RE-ESTABLISH A VODKA EMPIRE

Since finding his Grandmother Maroussia Zorokovich’s vivid account of life in and escape from Russia during the 1917 Revolution Dan has been obsessed by her riches to rags story of romance and exile. 2007 saw Optimistic Productions working on green screen sequences bringing the account to life in dramatic form within the development of the drama documentary ëFrom Bolshevism to Belfast’.

In February 2008, using her lively and colourful manuscript as a guide Dan went on a quest to the Ukraine. He discovered that within what some had dismissed as romantic fiction were the clues that led him not only to her estate but to the factory that her father had established in 1904 ‚ a spirits factory that was expropriated during the revolution but which is still open for business almost 100 years later.

With this twist in the story comes a new film as Dan embarks on importing the spirit of his ancestors into the UK and, following in their entrepreneurial footsteps, launching his own Vodka Empire with Zorokovich 1917.

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How To Re-Establish a Vodka Empire is in a permanent state of production as Dan attempts to import, brand and then distribute the vodka from his great-grandparents’ factory in order to pay for the dramatic scenes in the film… Watch the trailer and find out more about the people behind this work in progress here…

Hilary Powell brings Maroussia Zorokovich to life in the film, How to Re-Establish a Vodka Empire

The countryside around the factory, rich black earth perfect for cultivation.