“I can’t draw anymore. But for some reason, when I was a kid, I was a very good artist,” recalls Trevor Pryce, inside the sprawling studio space of The Outlook Company, his media and live-action animation business in the historic Hoen Lithographic building in East Baltimore.

“In 4th and 5th grade, I would take small pictures and draw them big, very close to scale—a lot were Mickey Mouse-type characters that I’d put on BMX bikes and skateboards and stuff. I was on my way to being a great artist and then puberty hit, and I lost all control of my limbs and fine motor skills. That was the end of that.”

Not quite. The 6-foot-6 Pryce regained control of his limbs well enough to become a 290-pound All-Pro defensive end, starring for three Ravens playoff teams. And though his drawing ability never returned, he realized after his playing career ended that his artistic sensibilities had never left.

Like many ballplayers, he initially struggled to find his post-football footing, penning a thoughtful piece for The New York Times about his restlessness. A longtime musician and movie buff, he had an interest in potentially scoring films, but since he doesn’t read music, that morphed into writing films.

Remarkably, Sony bought his first screenplay and Disney, his second. Then, it was three years before he sold anything else. However, he’d also co-authored a successful comic book novel, An Army of Frogs, illustrated by renowned comics artist Sanford Greene, which got picked up by Netflix, evolving into a three-season, 26-episode series in 2016.

The comic book and project, set in Australia, had been inspired by the BBC documentary Planet Earth and a particular high-speed camera shot of a frog jumping from tree to tree, which Pryce thought resembled a human superhero when fully stretched out.

“That was the spark and five minutes later, I remember saying to myself, ‘Ninja Turtles exist, has anybody done frogs yet?’ My next thought was, ‘Frogs need an enemy—scorpions. Holy cow, we need a place. Has anybody done Australia?’ It flooded out of me.”

Which brings us inside his state-of-the-art studio, fully dedicated at the moment to turning Kulipari: An Army of Frogs, the successful Netflix series, into a feature-length animated film.

On a recent morning, as an actor and staff member role play in motion-capture suits, pictured left above, Pryce explains that he hopes—no, expects—the film to catapult his animation company into a different stratosphere, the way the success of Star Wars allowed George Lucas to grow and expand LucasFilm.

His decision to establish his animation studio in East Baltimore instead of Hollywood, while perhaps unexpected to some, wasn’t that complicated. Pryce’s kids were doing well at the McDonogh School in Owings Mills, and he didn’t want to move them. And with institutions such as the Maryland Institute College of Art and the Baltimore School of the Arts, he feels there is plenty of talent here to develop.

“I’ve had overtures to move to other states. They said, ‘Hey, if you come, we can promise you X, Y, Z,’ and I’m like, ‘I wouldn’t mind taking your money and your space, but that means I’ve got to live where you are, and I don’t want to live there.’ I tell people all the time that being a media company, an animation and gaming studio, in Baltimore is a blessing and a curse. It’s a blessing because we’re the only one. It’s a curse because we’re the only one. So that has to change, and it will change once we’re successful.”

In the studio, the outgoing, 49-year-old Pryce jokes that he doesn’t touch any of the equipment. But once the frames are made and the animation is done, he does the editing In fact, he oversees production and works with the voice- over actors, including, by coincidence, a certain Stars Wars icon who was nominated for an Emmy in Pryce’s Netflix series. Pryce admits that even a former Super Bowl-winning football player (with a little fantasy-adventure obsession) can still get momentarily starstruck.

“The first day we were recording, I walked into our old studio and there’s Luke Skywalker sitting in front of me, right? He’d just got done shooting Star Wars: The Force Awakens. He’d read my comic book while filming in the Middle East. I’d tell him how I wanted something said and Mark Hamill would take direction from me. He’d say whatever I want him to say, in the way I wanted him to say it. He would 100 percent do it. It was great. He’s also a sweet, sweet guy. Very different from the Jedi master you think he is.”

ven though he’s wearing enemy colors, Ed Soth is greeted the same way he usually is when he walks into Robbie’s First Base—with some good-natured ribbing.

“We’re going to stop letting you in here with that hat,” says Robbie Davis Jr., half of what might be the most well-known Senior-Junior tandem in the world of Baltimore sports . . . memorabilia. “How’d you get to be a Yankees fan?”

The conversation that ensues is similar to ones that take place in bars, at barbershops, and during ballgames every day: a group of old friends shooting the breeze about sports. The fact that it happens to be taking place in what is likely the world’s only sports memorabilia/mail service store just adds to the fun.

When Robbie Davis Sr., 71, opened the store in this small Lutherville strip mall in 1989, he had no idea that one day he’d be working alongside his sons, Robbie Jr., 43, and Matthew, 32. He didn’t know that the business would morph from dealing primarily with FedEx and UPS packages to making deals for Frank Robinson and Johnny Unitas autographs. He certainly couldn’t have imagined that the family would star in an ABC reality series and be featured in a Netflix show scheduled to drop this summer.

The exchange going down is exactly what has attracted television producers, audiences, and, most importantly, regular old customers to Robbie’s.

“I grew up at the old stadium, used to sneak in all the time,” says Soth, who often comes in to send packages and stays to hang out. “Want to hear a funny story?”

It’s a rhetorical question—everyone at Robbie’s is always up for a laugh.

“One day I was there, I’m 11 years old, and I’m sitting in the stands and Mantle is in the field,” Soth says. “Ball is hit, comes right to me, and I reach over and grab [it]. Ball hits me in the hand and falls to the [warning] track. Swear to God, Mantle walks over, picks the ball up, looks at me, and I think he’s gonna toss it up to me. That sonofabitch turned and walked away.”

Sitting at his cluttered desk behind the counter, Senior, as many people call him, lets out a belly laugh. From his slightly less messy desk a few feet away, Junior does the same.

“We have a lot of people who just come in and talk sports,” Junior says. “We get 85-year-old grandmas in here on a Monday morning talking Ravens. They’ll say, ‘Did you see that play that Lamar made?’ I can’t believe my ears. That’s what makes it cool.”

Robbie Davis Sr. grew up in West Baltimore, where, as he likes to remind people, he was a “really good” baseball player at Edmondson-Westside High School.

“I always tell my son that even though he got signed to a pro contract, I was better than him,” he says. “And he can’t refute it, because I’m the only one who’s seen us both play.”

After graduating, he served as a combat medic in the Army before going into the car business. At one point, he co-owned 12 dealerships in Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania. Among them were All-Star Dodge and All-Star Chevrolet on Route 40. Orioles’ legends Brooks Robinson and Eddie Murray were among the athletes that did commercials for the dealerships, and Davis developed friendships with several guys on the team. When the O’s went on road trips, Davis would occasionally house-sit for Murray.

“Eddie Murray knew me before I knew who he was,” Junior says. “To me he was just a guy who was friends with my dad.”

One of Senior’s partners at the dealership collected baseball cards, and he took note when the man made some money buying and selling them. When he left the car business and opened a postal services store in Catonsville, then another in Lutherville, Senior put out a few boxes of baseball cards on the weekends.

Quickly, he realized that the Topps were topping his sales. He began buying and selling other brands that were hot at the time, like Upper Deck, and closed the Catonsville store to focus on the one in Lutherville.

 

“. . . THE BEST PART WAS GETTING TO BE AROUND PEOPLE THAT WERE AS PASSIONATE ABOUT COLLECTING MEMORABILIA AS WE ARE.”

 

“You never have a business where you can make money right away,” he says. “Well, the first month we opened up we were in the black.”

Perhaps his biggest challenge was keeping his sons from playing with his inventory. Where Senior saw an investment, Junior saw a pastime.

“He would buy all these unopened boxes and tell me, ‘Don’t open them,’” Junior recalls. “He would put them in our house in this room, and of course, I’m a little kid, so I’d be in there opening the packs because that’s what kids do. It’s no fun to just sit there and look at a box.”

A baseball addict from a young age, Junior played center field in college and was signed by the Milwaukee Brewers. When his career fizzled out in the minor leagues, he began working with his father in the store. As Robbie’s grew, the Davises began buying and selling all kinds of sports memorabilia: jerseys, autographed baseballs, seats from the old Memorial Stadium and Cole Field House. One of the most expensive items they acquired was a Babe Ruth signed baseball for $20,000. They later sold it for a tidy profit.

As their reputation continued to grow, more and more athletes started stopping by the store. Al Bumbry has been friends with Senior since they met in the mid-’80s. The Orioles Hall of Famer, who was awarded a Bronze Star for his service in the Army during the Vietnam War, still drops in often.

“The store presents a very social, laidback, easygoing atmosphere,” says Bumbry, the 1973 American League Rookie of the Year and a member of Baltimore’s 1983 World Series championship team. “People don’t feel pressured there because Bob’s a people person. Once he connects with you and becomes friends with you, he’s one of those guys that I would take in the foxhole with me.”

Lewis Brown was a 15-year-old kid when he first went to Robbie’s.

“Senior, he likes to take chances on people,” he says. “I didn’t grow up the richest, so sometimes I’d be in there and I’d go, ‘Mom, I want to get this,’ and she’d say, ‘Well I don’t have the money for it.’ There was a Barry Bonds-signed baseball. It was like a hundred and some dollars. He was like, ‘Just take it, and when you get the money just come in and pay for it.’ Ain’t nobody does that.”

It took Brown, now 35, a few weeks to scrape together the money. When he returned to the store, Senior offered him a job. He’s been working there ever since. When he was trying to save $10,000 for a down payment on a house, Senior asked how he was going to do it.

“I was like, ‘I don’t know. I’ll figure it out,’” Brown says. “He goes, ‘I’ll lend you the money and you can just pay me back when you get it.’ That’s the type of guy he is.”

In 2010, the producers of the reality show Pawn Stars contacted the Davises with an idea. They wanted to film a series about the business and its cast of characters. The core four in the show would be Robbie Sr., Robbie Jr., Brown, and Robbie Reier, another longtime employee. There was only one problem: way too many Robbies. Thus, Senior became Senior, Junior became Junior, Brown became “Sweet Lou,” and the then-baby-faced Reier became “Shaggy.”

In 12 episodes of Ball Boys, the guys goofed on each other, debated sports, negotiated with buyers and sellers, and interacted with greats from the sports world. They played basketball with former University of Michigan Fab Fiver Jalen Rose. Hall of Fame quarterback Warren Moon fired footballs at them. The legendary running back Jim Brown came to the store, but of all the sports royalty they met, baseball’s hit king, Pete Rose, was their favorite.

After shooting a segment, Rose asked for a restaurant recommendation for lunch. When Senior told him the production company would only pay a pittance for their food, Rose whipped $10,000 cash out of his pocket.

“He’s the kind of guy that if you go to a bar you want to hang out with,” Senior says.

When Sweet Lou asked for a personalized autograph, Rose wrote, “To Lou, you big fat piece of shit.”

“I loved that,” Brown says.

The show ran for just one season in 2012, but it was rebroadcast for years after that and is still available on ABC’s app. It raised the store’s profile both locally and nationally—they still get customers who say they heard of Robbie’s from Ball Boys.

“It was awesome,” Junior says. “I liked being on TV, but the best part was getting to be around people that were as passionate about collecting memorabilia as we are. We met people from all around the country, and we got to share our stories.”

Bob Windsor, aka Burger King Bob, is milling about the store, going back and forth with Senior about . . .something or other. The two are old friends. They get together on Sundays to watch football at Windsor’s house, where he makes sure Senior always has chips to snack on and Hennessy to wash them down.

An avid collector, he’s bought everything from a Babe Ruth-autographed baseball to Michael Jordan’s shoes at Robbie’s. But the products aren’t what keep him coming back.

“If there was a pot belly stove and an old dog, you’d be there for hours every day,” says Windsor, whose nickname stems from his job as a “financial guy” for several Burger King franchises. “It’s that homey.”

That’s never changed at Robbie’s, but the preferences of memorabilia consumers are ever-evolving. After a down period in the ’90s and 2000s, cards are back in vogue. And not just baseball cards. These days, Pokémon is as popular as Paul Molitor.

“I had a kid buy two $8 packs and he got a $700 card in there,” Junior says. “That’s what these cards are all about now. It’s all about the gamble.”

That being said, there are some athletes whose appeal is timeless in Baltimore. Cal Ripken Jr., Brooks Robinson, Gary Williams, and Ray Lewis items always sell quickly. But there’s one athlete whose popularity Junior says is unprecedented.

“Nothing’s been like Lamar,” he says of the Ravens quarterback. “[Jackson] has been the biggest craze that we’ve seen in this business since we’ve been open. People can’t get enough of him.”

Although the Davises are hometown fans—they live and die with the Orioles and the Ravens—and love sports memorabilia, the business requires a sort of cold lack of sentimentality. Anything they acquire could be gone the next moment.

“People say, ‘Is this for sale?’” Senior says. “I say, ‘Come on, if it’s got a price tag on it, it’s for sale.’”

Still, there are a few items in which they seem to take special pride. Near Senior’s desk hangs a signed photo of Orioles Mike Morgan and Fred Lynn from the mid-’80s. Lynn’s note reads, “To Bob, the second-best ballplayer I know.”

“That’s because I always told him I was as good as him,” Senior says, chuckling.

Above Junior’s desk is another framed photo, this one with Lynn and Eddie Murray standing over Senior, who is sitting in a chair with his then-eight-year-old son, Robbie Jr., on his lap.

Neither of those items have a price tag.

Jonathan Van Ness, star of Netflix’s massively popular Queer Eye reboot, is coming to town for a stop on his first solo comedy tour, “Jonathan Van Ness: Road to Beijing.” Audiences can expect plenty of the signature JVN charm they know and love, along with some fresh surprises. We caught up with America’s newly minted sweetheart and talked trying new things, believing in yourself, and some very interesting childhood memories of Baltimore.

You’re one-fifth of such a dynamic group on Queer Eye, and you all have such amazing chemistry together. Is it nerve-wracking to go on the road by yourself?
Yes! Headlining a standup comedy tour is definitely different than doing Queer Eye with such good friends, however it’s a whole new art form and world for me to learn and thrive in, and it’s really fun for the artist in me to figure that out, so it’s a challenge I’m into accepting.

Since most people know you from the show, what can folks expect to be different in your solo comedy show?
They can expect to get a much more fleshed out, layered version of my personality including tons of physical comedy inspired by my obsession with gymnastics, yoga, and, of course, figure skating. I’m never afraid of taking a hard and fast detour from what I think I’m going to talk about, so it can be a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants good time.

You’re on figure skates in the promos for your tour. What inspired you to start skating?
I’ve been obsessed with figure skating for my whole entire life and always wanted to try it out. As soon as I had my first lesson a few months ago, I knew I was going to be absolutely addicted, and now it’s something I’m going to keep working hard at for the rest of my life.

On your podcast, “Getting Curious with Jonathan Van Ness,” you cover everything from renaissance art history to the current political and humanitarian situation in Central America. How do you track down your expert guests for such a varied line up?
It used to be in the first season that I tracked them down myself. But now my team and I come up with what ideas we’re going to cover and start searching who will be the best fit. It’s a lot of research and a lot of emails.

Audiences connect with you so readily because you put your true self out there. Is it ever hard for you to put your heart out there and be vulnerable with the world?
For sure. It’s always scary to put yourself out there, but it was really important to me when this all started to stay authentic, and it’s definitely been worth it so far.

What advice do you have for someone who wants to try something new, or to show up more fully as themselves every day?
You can’t trust your fear. Of course, you’ve got to listen to her sometimes, but just go for it. Just go!

Have you traveled to Baltimore before? What do you know about the city?
I peed my pants in the [National] Aquarium when I was 7 and have unfortunately not gone back since. So I’m really excited to right the wrongs of my Christmas past in Baltimore.

Ever rocked our city’s signature hairstyle, the beehive?
I have NOT, but I would totally like to.

What do you think of Baltimore’s style in general? What would you do to give the city a makeover?
I think Baltimore is killing it. She’s northeast and gorgeous.

*If you have experienced or are experiencing sexual abuse, help is available through the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN). Please call 800-656-HOPE (4673) to be connected with a trained staff member from a sexual assault service provider in your area. 

**Be aware, this post includes spoilers for the Netflix docu-series The Keepers.

**This post has been updated with new information regarding the Archdiocese of Baltimore’s participation in the documentary, Maskell’s status as a priest following the abuse allegations, and the number of plaintiffs in the 1994 civil suit.   

On April 19, the trailer for the new Netflix documentary series The Keepers was released, and since then a heavy foreboding has hung in the air. What, everyone seems to be wondering, will the seven-part series reveal? Its intersecting subjects—widespread sexual abuse at South Baltimore’s Archbishop Keough High School in the ’60s and ’70s and the 1969 murder of Sister Cathy Cesnik, a 26-year-old nun, who many say was planning to reveal the abuse—are about as explosive as can be.  

For its part, the Archdiocese of Baltimore spent the week trying to get ahead of what it acknowledges is an unfavorable portrayal in the series. The church is represented in the documentary only through its answers to six written questions submitted by the filmmakers. Archdiocese spokesman Sean Caine admits the archdiocese declined filmmakers’ invitation to appear on camera, but insists that there was no nefarious motivation behind the decision. In fact, he says church officials would have welcomed the opportunity to participate in a more robust written correspondence. “I have my doubts about why they would not have had more questions for us,” Caine said Friday morning, after staying up all night to watch the series. “There was certainly a lot presented in the documentary that warranted additional questions that would have given us an opportunity to provide additional context for it. So I’m disappointed that we were given very few questions. Because, at the end of the day, it’s information you want. It doesn’t have to be on your terms. In other words, if you want to put us on camera to try to embarrass us by asking us questions we can’t answer, [we decline], but we’d be happy to research and get back to you.” Caine notes that The Archdiocese has created a microsite addressing the documentary’s release, which includes a FAQs page and a statement from Archbishop William E. Lori that was sent to the archdiocese’s entire email list earlier this week. 

Meanwhile, others see the documentary as a validation of the victims and those who have worked to tell their stories. On a Facebook group dedicated to solving Sister Cathy’s 47-year-old murder, Cesnik’s sister, Marilyn Cesnik Radakovic, wrote that, “This is a very difficult documentary to watch, but this documentary is about courage, and I hope this display of courage is felt by all that view this.”

In any case, the wait is now over. As of 3:01 a.m. today, The Keepers is available for streaming. Before you watch though, here are some things to know. 

1. This Has Been a Long Time Coming

Though Cesnik’s murder and the abuse scandal at Archbishop Keough have gone decades without the kind of international attention this series brings, these are not unknown events. Cesnik’s disappearance was front page news in November 1969, and made headlines again when her body was recovered from a secluded industrial area in Lansdowne in January 1970. After that, however, the trail seemed to grow cold and her death—from blunt force trauma to the head—was theorized to have been the result of a robbery gone wrong. But her memory lived on with her pupils. Over time, her death became something of an urban legend at the all-girls school, which was renamed Seton-Keough High School in 1988 and will close in June 2017 due to declining enrollment. 

2. The Story Was Kept Alive by a Dedicated Few 

Cesnik’s murder investigation heated up again in the ’90s when two women—both Archbishop Keough alums—brought a $40 million lawsuit against the Archdiocese of Baltimore and a priest named Father A. Joseph Maskell. The suit claimed that the plaintiffs had been subjected to physical, sexual, and emotional abuse, and that the church had covered up Maskell’s depravity. Furthermore, the lawsuit alleged that Maskell had been joined in the abuse by other clergy, police officers, a local gynecologist, and at least one politician. The plaintiffs were then known only as Jane Doe and Jane Roe, but the women have subsequently revealed themselves to be Jean Wehner (Doe) and Teresa Lancaster (Roe). Attorneys for Wehner and Lancaster located more than 30 people—both men and women—who were willing to testify against Maskell in the suit. Read more about the lawsuit in the award-winning 1995 Baltimore magazine article “God Only Knows”.  

In the mid-’90s, headlines about the lawsuit sparked the interest of two other Keough alumnae, Gemma Hoskins and Abbie Fitzgerald Schaub. Though neither experienced any abuse themselves, they were moved by the stories of the victims and the memory of their late teacher. With help from numerous others, they began conducting their own unofficial investigation. Several years ago, the duo began a public Facebook group, which recently surpassed 1,000 members. They also run a website where people can submit anonymous tips.

These four women—Wehner, Lancaster, Hoskins, and Schaub—will be at the center of The Keeper‘s narrative. 

3. The Lawsuit Was Dismissed, But The Archdiocese of Baltimore Has Since Compensated Victims

The lawsuit was dismissed in 1995 after a judge ruled that the suit had been filed outside the statue of limitations for juvenile abuse cases. (Wehner maintains that she only recovered memories of her abuse in the early ’90s, long after the statute of limitations had expired. Lancaster and many other victims say they always remembered their abuse but were too scared to go public. This spring, Maryland extended, from age 25 to age 38, the length of time victims of childhood abuse have to sue offenders.) Father Maskell was interviewed by police and had his priestly powers revoked by the archdiocese in 1994, but he was never charged with a crime. Before the civil trial could start, however, Maskell quietly moved to Ireland, where he found work as a psychologist, sometimes even treating adolescents. According to the archdiocese’s FAQ, “the Archdiocese learned in 1996 that Maskell was living in Ireland . . . [and] informed authorities in Ireland about Maskell’s history and attempted to contact Maskell in writing on numerous occasions.” Maskell eventually returned to the Baltimore area, where he lived in archdiocese-affiliated facilities until his death in 2001. Beginning in 2002, his name was added to a list of clergy credibly accused of abuse published on the archdiocese’s website. In addition, the Archdiocese acknowledges it has paid “over $97,000 in counseling assistance and over $472,000 in direct financial assistance to those who may [have] been abused by Maskell,” including Lancaster and Wehner.

4. Sister Cathy May Not Be the Only Murder Victim

It seems likely that the series will delve into theories connecting Cesnik’s murder to the death of three other women: 16-year-old Pamela Lynn Conyers, whose body was found in Anne Arundel County in 1970; 16-year-old Grace Elizabeth “Gay” Montanye, whose body was found in 1971 in South Baltimore; and 20-year-old Joyce Malecki, who disappeared just days after Cesnik and whose body was found in Fort Meade. Because Malecki’s body was discovered on federal property, the FBI had jurisdiction over the case. It is unclear, however, if the FBI investigated the case at that time. Maskell knew the Malecki family because they were parishioners at St. Clement Church in Lansdowne, where he lived and ministered for a time in the ’60s and ’70s. With the permission of the Malecki family, Schaub filed a Freedom of Information Request in August of 2014 for all files related to a 1994 FBI/Baltimore County homicide joint task force into Malecki’s death. So far, Schaub has received no files, but did receive a reply from the FBI in April stating, “Your request . . . is . . . still awaiting assignment to a disclosure analyst for processing. The current estimated date of completion for the request is October 2017. However, given our current workload and staffing levels, it may be a very long time before you begin to receive material from this request.”    

5. Maskell’s Body Was Exhumed In February For DNA Testing

In dramatic fashion, news broke on May 4 that Maskell’s body had been exhumed from a Randallstown cemetery in February and that DNA samples had been taken from it that would be compared to physical evidence from Cesnik’s murder scene. Then, this week, barely 48 hours before the premiere of the documentary, test results revealed that Maskell’s DNA did not match DNA found at the crime scene. “For now, we’ve pretty well reached the end of the road when it comes to forensic evidence,” Baltimore County police spokeswoman Elise Armacost told The Sun. “Our best hope for solving this case at this point lies with the people who are still alive. And we hope that someone will be able to come forward with conclusive information about the murder.”

Anyone with information about Cesnik’s murder is encouraged to contact the Baltimore County Police Department’s Homicide Department, Unsolved Case Squad. Information about the murder of Joyce Malecki can be submitted to the FBI’s Baltimore field office.

A year ago, in this very space, we were already trumpeting the success of HBO’s VEEP, but were a little uncertain about this whole House of Cards thing.

Sure, the pedigree was unimpeachable: David Fincher as executive
producer, Kevin Spacey as lead. But Netflix? Is the world really going
to take Netflix seriously as a producer of original content?

Oh, what a difference a year makes. Because not only did House of Cards
become a much buzzed about hit (inspiring the popular debate: Is it
better to binge watch your favorite Netflix series or savor the viewing
over the course of a few weeks?), but it got nine Emmy nominations,
winning three (including Fincher for Best Director).

Meanwhile, VEEP continues to be a source of local pride,
garnering eight nominations and wins for Tony Hale (yay!) and Julia
Louis-Dreyfus, the VEEP herself (double yay!). Also, the
adorable moment where Hale (in character, mind you) assisted
Louis-Dreyfus with her speech was one of the agreed upon highlights of
the show.

“Me so happy!!!!!!”—Julia Louis-Dreyfus after the show’s big wins, on Twitter