The Sticky, 2024 series on Amazon Prime revolves around Ruth, the central character and maple farmer who suffers a loss on her farm because of government actions. This leads her to team up with Remy, a security guard, and Mike, a mobster for a daring heist of maple syrup worth millions of dollars.
It is a comedy series loosely inspired by the real story of a Canadian Maple Syrup Heist of 2011 and 2012, one of the largest agricultural thefts in history. The Sticky comes up with twists to create drama but tries to keep some key facts intact.
Brian Donovan, the writer of the series encounters the real heist story by accident.
"I was at a boring family Christmas party, just looking for anything interesting to talk about," he recalled to CBC. "Fortunately, my brother-in-law is Canadian, and he was like, 'Hey, have you heard of the great maple syrup heist?' And I said, 'No, but please tell me everything about it right now.' And he did. He told me all about the crime, and then he also told me about Montreal and the different mafia groups that are there, and all the fascinating things about the area."
After the incident, Donovan got inspired to create The Sticky, Prime Video's six-episode series.
What Was The Great Canadian Maple Syrup Heist? The True Story
In 2011 and 2012, a group of thieves orchestrated a daring heist of stealing nearly 3000 tonnes of maple syrup worth $ 18.7 Million directly from the warehouse of the government federation in Quebec.
The syrup was stored in white metallic barrels and was open to inspection once a year. The thieves transported the barrels into a truck and sent them to remote sugar shacks. They filled the barrels with water instead and sent the barrels back to the facility. After a while, they started to siphon directly without filling it with water and shopped them to the South and East areas, trafficked in small batches to evade suspicion. The syrup was sold to syrup distributors who were unaware of the operation.
The Federation discovered the robbery in 2012 during a routine inventory check where they found many barrels empty and filled with water. After investigation, the police arrested 26 individuals including Richard Valliere, the ringmaster behind the scheme.
Finally, in April 2017, Richard was found guilty of fraud, theft, and selling stolen goods. Further, he was sentenced to 8 years of prison and a $9.4 million fine.
What is different in the series The Sticky?
The major change in The Sticky as compared to the real story is the pace at which the robbery takes place. In the series, the heist takes place in a few hours as the characters have schemed a way to re-fill the barrels with lake water. However in reality it took days for the robbery to take place and it was slow and methodical.
Remy's character is completely fictional in The Sticky. The series shows him as a security guard who helps them to have access to the warehouse. Another creative liberty the show has used is portraying the head of the organisation as corrupt and greedy. This might have been done to bring the characters an edge and give Ruth, the protagonist a reason to strike back.
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Donovan states that the characters are not modeled around real people. Donovan's intention was not to replicate the truth but to just get inspiration from it and keep rolling from there.
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