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Before Carmen, Basic Instinct, and Resident Evil 4, we had the Bible for our femme fatale entertainment. Delilah may have been the O.G. wicked seductress in the Judeo-Christian tradition, but the New Testament, not to be outdone by the Old, upped the ante with a belly dance and a beheading in the form of Salomé, a spoiled rotten brat who gets whatever she wants from daddy, including the heads of martyrs. OK, so maybe the belly dance wasn’t in the Bible, but who can blame Oscar Wilde for spicing up the Gospel tale in his theatrical treatment? Once Richard Strauss adapted it into an opera, we got the now-iconic, can’t-be-unseen image of Salomé smooching John the Baptist’s severed head, as well as the modern-day version of her dance, known as the striptease. The erotic mix of sex and death as performed by the Virginia Opera will make for a psychologically charged Valentine’s date. The performance begins at 8 p.m. at George Mason University’s Center for the Arts, 4400 University Drive, Fairfax. (703) 993-8888. cfa.gmu.edu.