ABOUT US
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Our Mission: Grackle Jack reimagines comedic theatre by blending drag, melodramatic clown, puppetry, and handcrafted special effects into original, camptastic productions. Centering queer perspectives, we satirize systems of oppression and transform community laughter into a shared act of joy and resistance.
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Who We Serve: Grackle Jack's work engages progressive adult audiences seeking escape from the drudgery of daily life. Rooted in the clown tradition, our shows build in audience participation at every turn, inviting them into a live, in-person dialogue. Recent sold-out productions in Austin reflect the city's appetite for communal, cathartic comedy that gives adults permission to be gloriously silly again.
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Our Artistic Values & Traditions: Our work draws on three distinct lineages: clown's total commitment to playing for the audience, camp and drag's tradition of exaggerating gender, and satire's long history of using laughter to confront power. Bringing these traditions together is what allows us to turn something as simple as shared laughter into an act of resilience; building a community that turns to comedy as medicine in the face of fear and violence.
OUR HISTORY
Founded in 2018 by Artistic Director CB Goodman, Grackle Jack has put their unique comedic spin on the death penalty, the origin story of Christianity, and capitalism. Known for its inspired use of clown, bouffon, drag, melodrama, puppetry, and music, the company often works with an ever-evolving group of directors, actors, puppeteers, and designers. Generating each piece for Grackle Jack takes years of collaboration and honors its own incubation period in order to keep the work alive and meet the specific needs of the show.
In 2026, Grackle Jack tackled it's first every Christmas show, THE E(XMAS)IST and the response was overwhelmingly positive with a sold out run and requests to bring it back as a holiday tradition. In 2023 their solo show, In The Beginning had an incredible sold out run in Austin and garnered multiple awards from New York Frigid Festival (Best Clown, Top Grossing, Jill Miersch Award), Atlanta Fringe (Producer's Choice Award) and Austin's B. Iden Payne Awards (Best Solo). The show was then remounted for the 2024 Fusebox Live Festival.
Sightlines Magazine reviewer Courtney Thomas said about In The Beginning, "a show that is both poignant and ridiculously silly. An immensely energetic performer, CB Goodman breathes life into everything she touches. Embracing live-ness and rolling with mishaps, she breaks the audience out of their assumptions and invites them to imagine new possibilities for both the theatre and their own narratives. Most of all, she makes them laugh."
In 2018, Grackle Jack and En Route Productions co-produced *some humans were harmed in the making of this show, and was named to two of Austin’s top ten “Best of” lists. It was nominated for 10 B. Iden Payne Awards and won 4 for Featured Actor in a Drama - Delanté Keys, Featured Actress in a Drama - Kate Taylor, Best Media Design - Lowell Bartholomee, and Best Sound Design - Lowell Bartholomee.
The show was described by Broadway World’s Frank Benge as “Theatre that takes you unexpectedly to another place…”, and by the Austin Chronicle’s Robert Faires as a performance “…staged with gleeful verve as a circus, and a sobering meditation on actions and consequences. Amazingly, it managed both and bonded its audience as much in silence as laughter.”
THE COMPANY
CB Goodman
Artistic Director/Founder
Roz Martine
Board Member
Mike Chin
Board Member
Jess Workman
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