Girls & Gods @ CHAC

When we were kids, we spent a lot of time reading Edith Hamilton's Mythology, soaking up heroic tales and Olympian feuds and tips on using hydraulic dynamics to remediate environmentally damaged areas. When we got to college, we ended up reading more classical mythology, but it didn't have that same wide-eyed appeal (or we were squinting more).

Girls & Gods has cranked our eyelids back open. We'd be the first to admit we got lucky -- we should have been worried more by the idea of updating Greek myth. But playwright Scot Augustson has tapped into the off-the-cuff absurdity, says the Seattle Times, that flavors the originals. Imagine an evening-in-Enumclaw scenario involving a drunken Zeus, spaced-out Dionysus, and one sexy bull in cow drag. This much camp, like heroin, may not be for kids. (The shadow puppet shows are pure South Park: rude and hilarious.) But Girls & Gods isn't a one-bellow joke; it's an exploration of love, commitment, the metamorphosis of biological motherhood, and abuse of power.

Carys Kresny's antic, insightful direction shows off a wealth of acting talent: Allan Armstrong, Alycia Delmore, Peggy Gannon, Stephen Hando, Shannon Kipp, Stacey Plum, Brandon Simmons, and John Wray, in multiple roles. Brandon Simmons plays six roles with such remarkable definition that we kept belatedly recognizing that this was the same guy who was just that other guy. Stephen Hando was a force of nature -- jocular, lusty, a never-less-than-live wire making a case for deeper connections, deeper transformations. (Complete with a little Burning Man smack -- take that, Burners!)

Plum is Wren, the instigator of a teachable moment for heedless rapists Zeus (Armstrong, with righteous bravado and bluster) and Dionysus (Hando, radiating with sensual glee). The two spend their time of confinement at the Lillian Erstwhile Home for Unwed Mothers with an assortment of single moms and their tales of seduction by Poseidon in sailor's gear, a B-list Hercules named Leftherios, and a really nice guy whose day (and night) job is being Death.

Plum also plays the bookish archaeologist named Hazel whose major expedition is to fall for the urbane linguist Emile (Simmons) -- it's not a subplot, more of a modern-day mirror, the human side of the story. If the gods are bewildered by ending up in a farce, here two ironic wits wind up stumbling through one of those elevated moments you'd like to hold onto but just can't. If we weren't busy laughing -- at times, we saw people having trouble catching their breath -- we were hooked once again by how human gods make us feel.

Girls & Gods
Printer's Devil Theater @ CHAC
Thurs-Sat, through March 31
Tickets: $15

Top photo: Brandon Simmons and Stacey Plum. Bottom photo: Stephen Hando, Alycia Delmore, Allan Armstrong, Shannon Kipp and Peggy Gannon in Girls and Gods, or, Prometheus Unwed. Photos: Steven Miller.