As one of the many ways it is celebrating Black History Month, Major League Baseball (MLB) partnered with the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum and Black-owned creative entities Invisible Collective and animation studio Martian Blueberry on original animated series Undeniable. Invisible’s founder and baseball fan Justin Polk creatively spearheaded the project and co-directed with Carl Jones, who is both a director for Invisible and the founder of Martian Blueberry.
Undeniable tells stories of the Negro Leagues, starting with some of the women who made an impact in the leagues. Three episodes of the series, each approximately five minutes long, will air across MLB’s social and digital platforms during February, which is Black History Month.
Episode one, “Women of the Negro Lines,” tells the stories of female Negro League players Toni Stone, Connie Morgan and Mamie “Peanut” Johnson. It premiered on February 1, which is National Girls & Women in Sports Day.
Episode two will release on Wednesday, February 8 and explore the Negro League’s international impact. Episode three, featuring iconic Black players Jackie Robinson and Monte Irvin, releases on Wednesday, February 15.
Major League Baseball is bringing Undeniable directly to Historically Black College & University campuses, screening the episodes and then holding career fairs at Southern University on January 31 and on February 23 at Bowie State University. Representatives from Invisible Collective and Martian Blueberry will also participate on a panel and Q&A with students at Bowie State on how the project came to life.
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CREDITS
Client: Major League Baseball
Chief Operations & Strategy Officer: Chris Marinak
EVP, Chief Marketing Officer: Karin Timpone
SVP, Creative and Content Marketing: Scott Weisenthal
VP, Creative Studio: Geoff Proud
Director, Projects, Creative and Content Marketing: Gordon Lessersohn
Director, Production: Matt Mantyla
Producer: Palmira Ríos Segura
Project Manager: Gemma Kaneko
Project Manager: Danielle Skowronek
VP, Social Responsibility: April Brown
Director, Community Affairs: Kevin Moss
Created by Justin Polk, Beau Abbott and Bryan Abbott
Production Company: Invisible Collective
Live Action Director: Justin Polk
Executive Producer: Sam Kelly Jr.
Director of Photography: Adam Bial
Writers: Justin Polk, Beau Abbott and Bryan Abbott
Animation Studio: Martian Blueberry
Animation Director: Carl Jones
Executive Producers: Love Barnett, Omar McClinton and Carl Jones
Animation Supervision: Vini Wolf and Agenor Furigo Neto
Coordinators: Ana Carolina Antunes
Animation Editor: Alaric C. Martin
Art Director: Diego Molano
Animation Compositors: Ryan Cunningham, Danyell Dean
Music Composition by: Mark Iacone
Sound Post-Production: Fiddle Leaf Sound
Sound Design and Mix: Ben Freer
Color and Finishing: Guide Era VFX
Colorist/Flame Artist: Evan Guidera
Tags: black history month invisible collective major league baseball martian blueberry negro leagues