General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20264 min read

The Lions of Sicily

The Lions of Sicily (Italian: I leoni di Sicilia) is an Italian historical drama television series directed by Paolo Genovese, based on Stefania Auci's bestselling 2019 novel of the same name about the rise of the Florio family, real spice merchants who built a commercial empire in 19th-century Palermo¹. The eight-episode first season premiered on Disney+ on October 25, 2023, with the final episode on November 1, 2023².

Key fact	Detail
Original title / language	I leoni di Sicilia; Italian³
Run	1 season, 8 episodes, October 25 to November 1, 2023, on Disney+²
Director and writers	Paolo Genovese; screenplay by Ludovica Rampoldi and Stefano Sardo, based on the novel by Stefania Auci³
Budget	€31,771,863.85, including an €8,544,929.52 tax credit and €100,000 in development funding from Italy's Direzione Generale Cinema e Audiovisivo³
Lead cast	Michele Riondino (Vincenzo Florio), Miriam Leone (Giulia Portalupi), Donatella Finocchiaro (Giuseppina Florio), Vinicio Marchioni (Paolo), Eduardo Scarpetta and Paolo Briguglia (Ignazio), Ester Pantano²
Rating	TV-MA; IMDb 7.0/10⁴
Source novel	I leoni di Sicilia (2019), about 700,000 copies sold in Italy; sequel L'inverno dei Leoni (2021) won the Bancarella Prize 2022⁵

Spoilers

Story

The series follows brothers Paolo and Ignazio Florio, small spice merchants who leave poverty-stricken Bagnara Calabra in Calabria for Palermo, where they open an apothecary and quickly become wealthy⁶. Paolo's son Vincenzo transforms the family business into an economic empire in the years leading up to the Unification of Italy⁶.

Vincenzo's ambition centers on social standing: he wants to be treated as an equal by the Palermo nobility, a goal he believes requires marrying an aristocrat. Instead he falls in love with the middle-class Giulia Portalupi and gives up his aspirations of nobility, leaving their son Ignazio the task of upholding the Florio name⁶. Episode plots weave the family drama into historical events: a cholera epidemic in Palermo, during which Vincenzo conceives the idea of an independent merchant fleet in the Mediterranean; the 1848 revolution, in which Vincenzo helps the rebels through Giulia's intervention; and the chaos that follows unification⁷.

Production

Adaptation and crew. The series was produced by Lotus Production and Compagnia Leone Cinematografica for Disney+³. Fabrizio Lucci served as cinematographer, shooting on ARRI ALEXA Mini LF cameras with Zeiss lenses after location tests with three camera and lens combinations in Sicily¹. Alessandro Lai was costume designer⁸.

Filming. Production ran for 22 weeks across Sicilian locations including Trapani, Cefalù, Favignana, Marsala, and Palermo, with 19th-century Palermo also reconstructed on a backlot in Rome¹. Lucci described Palermo's light as unusually low, "almost like there was sunset all day long," and said the team considered series such as Peaky Blinders and Taboo as visual references before abandoning them for a look grounded in the actual locations¹.

Release. The series premiered at the Rome Film Festival on October 23, 2023, before its Disney+ debut⁸. The theme song is by Laura Pausini⁸. In the United States it streams on Disney+ and Hulu⁹.

The source novel and the Florio family

Stefania Auci, a writer born in 1974 in Trapani, published I leoni di Sicilia in 2019 after three years of research; it became a bestseller in Italy and was translated into several languages, including an Arabic edition released by Al Arabi Publishing and Distribution in Cairo¹⁰. ANSA reported about 700,000 copies sold in Italy for the first volume, with the sequel L'inverno dei Leoni (2021) winning the Bancarella Prize in 2022; the saga spans roughly the early 1800s to 1950⁵. A later account of Auci's career describes the novel as having sold more than a million copies internationally¹¹.

The Florios were a real entrepreneurial dynasty. In the novel's account, the family expands from spices into silk, sulfur, lace, tuna, and Marsala wine, becoming one of Sicily's wealthiest families over the 19th century¹². A HarperCollins rights guide describes the fictional Vincenzo as looking beyond Sicily toward Rome, European courts, naval domination of the Mediterranean, and the purchase of the Egadi archipelago¹³.

Reception

The series holds a 7.0/10 rating on IMDb from about 930 users⁴. Rotten Tomatoes lists no critic reviews and an audience average of 56% from fewer than 50 ratings⁷. Viewer commentary has been divided: some praised the locations and production values, while others criticized the soundtrack choices and a fractured timeline¹⁴. The show ended after its single season¹⁵.

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026