Sofía Vergara, the star of “Modern Family,” invited the “Narcos” showrunner Eric Newman to her home in Los Angeles in 2015 to pitch a TV show about the Miami drug lord Griselda Blanco.

Corben's 2006 documentary "Cocaine Cowboys," which chronicles the Miami drug war of the late 1970s, was the spark that arguably ignited the modern-day fascination with Blanco's mother, Griselda ...