The latest reviews from the festival

Dance Triple Bill 3***
DanceHouse

Thankfully, it's no longer provocative to put a wheelchair user on stage, and it is a shame that Rhona Coughlan and Tara Brandel's Lean was dismissive of choreography and too intent on celebrating two mixed-ability bodies together. Clumsy in format, it was over-reliant on words where a physical statement might have been more eloquent and forceful. Equally lean choreography in Catherine Young's solo Traces wasn't helped by technical glitches and a nonplussed performance.

Words and motion were in perfect balance in Lingering on a Diagonal, in which psychotherapist Nick Bankes plucks a bass and tells us what is wrong  with the budding romance of dancers

Nick Bryson and Cristina Goletti. Pitched somewhere between lecture and gossip, it took a 21st-century solution to resolve the 21st-century relationship's problems: a telephone poll with the audience on whether the couple should stay together.

Although a bit rough around the edges, it's nevertheless responsible for two of the red stars above. (Run ended) - Michael Seaver

Grounded**
The Ark

The Ark, Dublin's cultural centre for children, is celebrating its 12th birthday. It's a fantastic place with a committed staff and a terrific atmosphere, so it would be good to report that Grounded - written and directed by Róise Goan as part of the Year of Childhood celebrations - does the occasion justice. Disappointingly, however, the play - which evolved through a collaborative process with schools - is a strangely unfocused and largely humourless piece that lacks both narrative cohesion and dramatic tension. The 60-minute monologue of the central character, Finn (Stephen O'Rourke), moves towards the realisation that "taking care of his own little patch" (literally, in this case) is not enough and that he will have to journey to the US, a dangerous place engulfed in civil war, to rescue a pair of missing sisters. This rite of passage is achieved through the three young actors' (the sisters turn up to assist in their discovery) acrobatic use of ropes.

Everyone works hard and all hearts are in the right places, but even rope-flying over Chisato Yoshimi's dreamy set isn't enough to compensate for the lack of a decent script. (Final two shows next Saturday)- Hilary Fannin

Guardian Angels ****
Smithfield Plaza

Three firemen love their work so much that they start fires in order to put them out. German troupe Bängditos lit up the Dublin night in this piece of combustible street theatre, in which the titular angels seemed as capable of attack as of protection.

Although reined in by barriers around the plaza, the characters happily smashed through the "fourth railing". They lunged over barriers to hug spectators, while dousing them with water and rolling flames over their heads. All the senses were engaged: explosions shattered nerves and eardrums, fireworks burned retinas, water splashed skin and acrid smoke filled nostrils.At times, the action was located fully within the play's universe.

"Die engine ist kaputt!" screamed the firemen when their truck would not start. The problem turned out to be a chicken trapped in the engine - which the pyromaniacs promptly decided to roast. Such comic turns relieved the tension inherent in playing with fire. All in all, exhilarating stuff. (Run ended) - Denis Clifford

Mamuska ****
Back Loft

One to five stars seems a narrow spectrum, but as any Fringe regular knows, the gulf between excellent and bad can be enormous. Mamuska offers a setting where the bad doesn't seem so awful and the good seem great.

Candles, cushions, battered chairs and coffee tables play their role, as well as the wine and beer, so the whole night feels a bit more like a party with party-pieces than a performance. There is still the precariousness of the open-mic setting, and one late addition to the programme - a storyteller - was truly dismal.

Elsewhere, better pedigrees - such as choreographers Michael Klien (Daghdha), David Bolger (Coiscéim) and Fearghus Ó Conchúir (Corp Feasa) - offered re-workings or works-in-progress and Katarina Mojzisova reported on her latest piece for the sun and clouds. Transferred from Daghdha's home base in Limerick to the charmingly ramshackle Back Loft, a new line-up concludes Mamuska next Saturday. - Michael Seaver

Random ****
Samuel Beckett Theatre

The underlying structure of the universe, the laws of causality and probability, and the paradox present in Chaos Theory can be a lot to digest in the course of an hour of physical theatre - in German. But the Swiss company Plasma present such heady ideas with a seductive combination of funky live music, physical grace, temporal fillips and a frayed, lush aesthetic that owes something to the flashy uncertainty of a Vegas casino.

For the most part, the cerebral trippiness is as absorbing as a much-belated collaboration between David Lynch and Stephen Hawking. But for all Plasma's determination to unsettle us - and themselves - with the possibility (nay, probability) of performative breakdown, their music always imposes order on chaos, harmony on divergence, and even if the script appears to be in tatters, the surtitles, tellingly, never are. Still, you leave this absorbing performance nudged into a new appreciation of patterns, improbability and the infinite potential of Casio keyboards. What are the chances? (Run ended)- Peter Crawley

Twelve Songs**
Cobalt Café

Tríona Ní Dhuibhir, a regular singer with the interesting Cantóirí Choir, made her cabaret debut in this show with a wide variety of songs. The results, like her chosen repertoire, were at best mixed.

A difficulty emerged with the two opening numbers, Big Spender and Cabaret, belters both. For whatever reason - perhaps nerves - the performer's voice was deficient in control, falling to a semi-audible whisper at some points and rising to shrillness at others. This persisted throughout the show, which never developed the vocal intimacy with the material and audience that cabaret demands.

The second half included a lugubriously slow German version of Mack the Knife, a bouncy but not infectious version of All That Jazz, and others that often failed to ignite. In sum, a courageous hour of obvious effort, not matched by achievement. (Run ended) - Gerry Colgan

Urban Playground***
Wolfe Tone Park, Dublin

Parkour, or Free Running, we are told, "is a rapidly growing movement/ art form/ way of life that has young people reclaim their surrounding architecture by using it as play and training ground to find ways of overcoming obstacles in the most efficient and graceful manner". It may well be so, but what we saw at the weekend looked more like a highly disciplined, seriously strenuous army commando exercise which ran for 15 minutes. It was more intriguing than entertaining, as these young people with elastic bodies and enormous stamina ran through their routine while we, sloths,

stood idly by. As interesting was the urban setting with its flypast of pigeons, one drunk and his dog, and a how now bronze cow. She was unmoved. (Run ended) - Patsy McGarry

Vaudevillains*****
Samuel Beckett Theatre

This magical German show is a fusion of new technology and timeless skills as hapless Bruno, a country station master, becomes somehow engulfed in a multimedia screen and involved in slapstick adventures with a magician and a stagehand, who step in and out of the screen with split-second precision.

Impeccably staged by Markus Michalowski, Vaudevillains showcases the awesome range of Michael Moritz - who plays all three characters - as dancer, conjuror, acrobat, comedian, singer and juggler. There is a great feel for silent comedy; Moritz, like Buster Keaton, has constant problems with hostile inanimate objects, and the in-and-out-of-the-screen comedy recalls Keaton's Sherlock Jr. In more direct homage, there is a magnificent re-creation of the famous hat-juggling routine of another legendary clown,  George Carl.

Vaudevillains is a show definitely not to be missed. Take the children: they won't get all the old showbiz references but they'll still be enchanted, and you'll be amazed. (Runs Sept 20-23) ... Stephen Dixon

War of The Roses: The Risen****
Amphitheatre, Dublin City Council

The singular achievement of Whiplash productions' ridiculously fun rock-opera version of the history plays (Shakespeare in the Park meets The Rocky Horror Picture Show) is not so much Gavin Kostick's smooth truncation of Henry VI parts two and three (a saga so sprawling that, to this day, scholars have never agreed where it should best feature a food fight); or the calibre and size of a cast that can be assembled for a one-off performance; or even the witty commentary, grinding music and pulse-racing action pieces that are the signature of director Paul Burke.

What truly sets it apart is the immediacy of communication that holds an outdoor audience fast, never losing focus among a cast of thousands (or Gaiety School of Acting students). The second in, one

hopes, an ongoing series, Kostick's treatment is broader than last year, his nods to Iraq occasionally clunky, but here history courses with so much imagination, caustic wit and sheer preposterousness that it should be on the syllabus. (Run ended) ... Peter Crawley

The Whistling Girl****
Spiegeltent  

Uncomfortable in her skin to the point of self-loathing, Dorothy Parker initially seems an unlikely inspiration for a cabaret show. Composer Trevor Knight, however,

saw past the cynicism and found in the sardonic wit of the New Yorker's poems

the springboard for this show by his band, Featherhead. Parker's misanthropic verse is phrased in deliciously acidic terms and Knight deployed similarly disarming musical settings here. In Symptom Recital, he underscored Parker's paean to depression with sunny, brassy sounds. Chanteuse Susan Rowland, meanwhile, breathed charm into every one of Parker's words. During Observation she thundered: "I shall stay the way I am / Because I do not give a DAMN!"

Despite ranging from jazz to rock and from electronica to cabaret, the show's elements meshed well, including the intra-song recitations by Michael Ford (and, creepily, by Dottie herself in recorded form). It is easy to picture Mrs Parker viewing this show with both a hiked eyebrow and a wry smile. (Run ended)- Denis Clifford