Off-Square Theatre’s ‘The Fourth Nail’

Wednesday, April 23, 2008

By Ben Cannon

Jackson Hole, Wyo.-A new play making its stage debut this week with the Off-Square Theatre Company journeys back in time to explore what, unfortunately, seems to be some age-old, yet timeless, themes.

“The Fourth Nail,” written by Jackson playwright Bob Berky, is set in Prague in 1099, the year Christian armies sacked Jerusalem in a bloody conquest of that holy city while fighting under the banner of the Crusades.

The play, named for a relic purportedly used in Christ’s crucifixion, follows two clownish knights - Berthoud, played by regular Off-Square actor Jamie Reilly, and Baldwin, played by Berky - who have just returned from the Crusades. They have brought back with them some Holy War spoils of dubious authenticity: birdseed from the pocket of St. Francis, a grape from the Last Supper and a pile of thumbs from various deceased holy figures. The two are intent on making small fortunes on the  relics.

The knights return to the court of Blind King John, played by Jackson’s Stephen Lottridge. John the Blind, as he is also known, was the actual King of Bohemia in 1099.
While the characters in “The Fourth Nail” express the gamut of human qualities between deplorable and touching, the literally sightless monarch is, somewhat ironically, less ambivalently moral. His blindness allows him to see into greater depths than the cast of flawed characters around him.

“I think the issues that are involved in this play are very contemporary,” Berky said. “History repeats itself: the way people treat one another, the misuse of religion.”
During exchange between the knights-cum-profiteers-of-carnage, Baldwin says to Berthoud, “Remember the time you killed Saracen children because I had a cold?”

Berky, purposefully employing absurdity here, juxtaposes in that statement an atrocity – the slaughter of Muslim children – with the usual trappings of a warm, caring friendship. The effect conveys the range, good and bad, of what is distinctly ‘human.’  The complexity of human relations that lingers in such dualities is the play’s major trope.

Two New York City actors - Carine Montbertrand as an unusual court jester and Chris Clavelli, playing a mad alchemist called Arnoldus - were brought in for “The Fourth Nail.” Clavelli made his Jackson Hole Debut last fall, when he directed Off Square’s production of “Stones in His Pockets.”

“The Fourth Nail” makes its world premiere with a special 8 p.m. preview Thursday at the Center for the Arts. It will stage seven more times over the next two weeks. Go to www.offsquare.org or call the Center’s box office at 733-4900 for more information.

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In honor of Holocaust Remembrance Week, Jackson Hole Jewish Community and the library have partnered to screen “Paperclips,” a documentary film about a school in rural school in Tennessee whose students set a formidable goal: collect a paperclip for each of the 11 million Jews, gypsies, homosexuals and other victims of the Holocaust. The film will show at 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday in the library’s Ordway Auditorium. Retired middle school  teacher Ann Carruth will lead a discussion following the film.

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With the Teton County Library offering a bounty of accessible, and even accidental ways to commune with poetry as part of its promotion of National Poetry Month, this weekend will bring in a lyrical artist working in a form that, 30 years after its birth, is now securely in the pantheon of verse.

Laramie-based rapper Adrian Molina, aka Mo Brown, not only delivers hip-hop with a conscientious message, dealing with themes of diversity, social justice and politics, he also lectures at the University of Wyoming on the history of the form. He is a graduate of UW’s law school.

In his latest effort, titled “Up Before the Sunrise,” Molina focuses on the idea that every individual has an artist inside him or her. In harnessing that artistic spirit, the autonomy of voice and a positive form of expression can transcend otherwise oppressive forces.
Molina, the son of a Mexican immigrant father, has a particular interest in spreading an encouraging message to the nation’s Latino communities.

Molina will speak and perform at 7 p.m. Saturday in the Ordway Auditorium at the Teton County Library.

Molina will give a separate presentation on “What to Expect in College” for Latino students and families from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Thursday in the Ordway Auditorium. An interpreter will translate the talk into both Spanish and English. Call 733-2164 for more information.

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Off-Square Theatre’s ‘The Fourth Nail’ | Planet JH News Article: General Music Arts and Culture

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