Review: In the Beginning

There is an inflatable sheep in this show, oh yes, with precise, remote-controlled mobility. Watch it move, see it dance, there it goes! There’s also a big ol’ inflatable palm tree and a blondly generic blow-up doll – a liltingly lingam’d and easily manipulated plastic Adam to the madam known as Eve.

Eve: That’s performance artist CB Goodman, in this case. In the Beginning, her arch and whimsical queering of the Bible’s Genesis myth, is the one-woman show – the “wild woman dum dum show” – currently bringing bright laughter and delight to audiences packed into the Rude Mechs’ Crashpad space over at Bolm Studios. Goodman is ever onstage and pretty much naked throughout the performance, her long and naturally curled tresses like a cataract of hazlenut horchata halfway down her back, just past her breasts in front, with nothing but a cartoonishly bold merkin-with-extras occluding her netherly, um, power points in this presentation. She’s a joyful and antic presence in a spare but strikingly prop-enhaced set.

(Oh, hell, maybe she’s wearing a wig on top, too? It’s gorgeous, anyway, that sinuous pelt.)

There’s no specific arc to this Genesis re-envisioning, or maybe such plotwise mirroring is too subtle for your reviewer to grok, or too tenuous to filter through the hijinx that’s been inspired by the Western world’s woman-repressive creation myth. But certain nonsecular icons are recognizable, and they’re reacted to, here all shifted and turned widdershins wacky by the curious, exploring, and kinetic-yet-taciturn terpsichorean Goodman. Little skit after little skit, movement and sounds informed by diverse hands, all of it unraveling the ancient hairshirt to form adorable neko hats for everyone.

You can imagine Eve’s predecessor, Lilith – kibitzing from beyond her own repressed narrative – you can imagine her drunk on fermented pomegranates and telling that lissome rib-born creature, whispering to her like, “You won’t have to smash the patriarchy later, babe, if you can show how fucking silly it is now.”

Ah, would that it were so simple! And would that smashing anything were half as enjoyable as watching this show.

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CB Goodman’s In the Beginning continues through Feb. 11. Thu.-Sat., 8pm. Crashbox, 5305 Bolm #12. $15 and up. gracklejack.com