Couple redefine home videos

Stewartstown filmmakers Scott and Joy Kecken work from home and recently finished a documentary titled ‘We Are Arabbers’

By MIKE CAGGESO
Daily Record/Sunday News
Sunday, June 12, 2005

Baltimore native Scott Kecken waited seven years to watch “We Are Arabbers,” a documentary about the few remaining horse-drawn produce salesmen in the streets of his hometown.

When the movie screened at the Maryland Film Festival in May, Kecken leaned as far back in his front-and-center seat as he could, his head angled upward. Since there weren’t seats in front of him, he stretched his legs out as far as they could go. His sincere, relaxed smile expressed a release of anticipation as if he’d been waiting, oh, about seven years to see this movie.

Behind him, an older gentleman, sitting alone, voiced his opinions of the film as they crossed his mind.

“That’s right.”

“Amen to that.”

“Thank the Lord.”

It wasn’t a disturbance to Kecken. Actually, it was flattering. Kecken and his wife, Joy, filmed “We Are Arabbers,” and the talkative man, William “Man Boy” Savoy , is a good friend of the Keckens. He’s also one of the last remaining arabbers in the country.

The lights turned on as the credits rolled, revealing a vertical trail of moist skin under Savoy’s eye.

“I never dreamed I’d see my life’s work on film,” Savoy said. “I get tears in my eyes because I always dedicated my heart to this since I was a little boy.”

In the 150-plus years peddlers have been selling produce from horse carts in cities across the country, a world of cars and supermarkets gradually developed. The peddlers buy fruits and vegetables in bulk from regional markets in the first couple of hours of the day and spend mornings cart-

ing the produce through neighborhoods.

The term “arabber” (pronounced a-rab-ber) doesn’t have a specific origin or meaning. It’s just what they are called in Baltimore, Savoy said.

Only a handful of them remain, and Baltimore is the only city with them.

Scott and Joy, who live in Stewartstown, decided to make a documentary about arabbers after talking to a few of them in the late 1990s.

When Scott stood up to take questions from the festival’s audience, one told him that he is to arabbers what documentary maestro Ken Burns is to Negro League Baseball.

“We just knew it was compelling and there was a great story here,” Kecken told the crowd. “We thought it’d only take three years tops.”

But alas, the countless hours of researching, interviewing, filming and editing were squeezed into a seven-year span that also included moving, changing jobs, getting married and having a child.

Such is the life of a married couple in the film industry.

Scott and Joy met at Towson University in 1994. She was an undergraduate studying film; he was the manager of the film department’s production equipment.

After Joy graduated, they started dating in New York City. He was working at Cornell University. She was writing a script after interning as a writer for the hit series “Homicide: Life on the Street.”

That script became their first movie, 1998’s “Louisville,” a short film about the bonds of fatherhood told through the dialogue of three generations of black men. Joy was able to cast Andre Braugher through her connections with “Homicide.” The movie won numerous awards and was shown on PBS, BET and Showtime.

In 1999, Scott became a film instructor at Villa Julie College in Baltimore. A couple years later, Joy became a writer for the HBO series “The Wire.” Last year, the couple released another short film, “Woman Hollering Creek,” which they wrote and directed.

And since 1997, they have been immersed in the subculture of arabbers, a community of aging black men with a passion for horses and an exorbitant amount of friendly customer service.

“In making a documentary, you should reach out to the subject and ask for their trust. That requires you to build a bond with your time, energy and effort,” Joy said. “We spent seven months getting to know them. We went arabbing, going to stables — we just went out of our way to say, ‘We aren’t just going to take a picture of you and run.’”

But in doing so, the Keckens learned a hard lesson about the dangers of mixing work and family life.

Weekends disappeared and more film equipment filled their bedroom each month. And that’s when they knew they needed to do two things: finish the film and leave work at the office.

“One of the things we learned is that we have to talk about other things besides the film in our spare time,” Scott said. “There was a point where that’s all we talked about, and that’s not good in general.”

That’s quite a challenge considering their home is their office. And adding to that is their 16-month-old son, Tawadi, who matures more into a toddler each day.

“It’s an industry, like factory work. You work 12, 14, 16 hours a day,” Joy said. “It’s so hard to justify spending that much time away from your family.”

Creative country solace

The family is living in Toronto until July because Joy is working as a “script doctor” on the set of “Get Rich or Die Tryin’,” a semi-biographical movie about rap star 50 Cent.

The script — about a drug dealer aspiring to be a rapper — was sketched by a set of screenwriters in Hollywood. Joy’s job on the set is to make last-minute adjustments to the script if a line or scene doesn’t pan out the way it is imagined.

“It is surprising by the image he gives off in the media, but he’s dedicated and disciplined to this movie,” Joy said of first-time actor 50 Cent. “He’s so open and willing to go to all the places that are necessary.”

When they return, they will try promoting “We Are Arabbers,” a task Scott said can be as daunting as making the movie.

“There’s a market for it. It’s just a matter of finding where that market is,” Scott said.

They want to pitch it to niche film festivals, academia and, of course, the city of Baltimore. And when the DVD is pressed this summer, they might book area theaters and tour just like a hungry band trying to get their name and product out.

“We have to think outside of the box because this is a film where you have to do that,” Joy said.

One thing is certain though: The Keckens found a creative solace in Stewartstown — close enough to their day jobs, far enough to escape them.

“We either wanted to live in the city or somewhere really far out,” Scott said. “It’s so beautiful here that I know that even if we move, I’m never going to sell this house. I’ll always have this as a base.”

Reach Mike Caggeso at 771-2051 or mcaggeso@ydr.com