How to make Salome genuinely shocking? The spectacle of nudity and female sexual agency hardly suffices anymore: especially when said female is punished for her agency in a kind of reactionary spectacle. Many productions have emphasized Salome’s youth, but few have gone as far as this spectacular and visceral production at the Komische Oper by Evgeny Titov. It had everything: a fiercely committed small-house Salome from Nicole Chevalier, singing from inside a Margiela-esque mask that totally obscured her face! A John the Baptist (Gunther Pappendell) first shirtless and then not only beheaded but flayed! Hundreds of severed heads revealed for one spectacular stage moment! Karolina Gumos as Herodias clomping around the stage in a gold dress and platform heels! A Herod (Matthias Wohl­brecht) who actually sang the part instead of yelling! A multiple-Salome dance of the seven veils made theatrically plausible because the masks made specific identities unclear! And a final coup de theatre in which Salome drew eyes on her mask using John’s blood before erasing them and staring at the audience with her mask a scribble of blood.