REVIEWS

Dublin Fringe Festival reviews

Help! **

T36

One basic rule of comedy is never to explain your jokes. But Help!, devised by several Tiernans and performed by two (Eleanor and Niamh - Tommy is absent), is determined to expose the mechanics of stand-up, stewing in the self-belief, self-doubt and self-criticism of a life behind the mic. "I'm dying on me hole," says engagingly rubber-faced Eleanor, resorting to impenetrable industry jargon for the benefit of her sarky straight man, Niamh.

With Eleanor's sights set on becoming the next Samuel Beckett rather than Bill Hicks, the show's problem is that it doesn't cleave to the wit or discipline of either. It's too fumbling and unwieldy for a play, too gauche for stand-up and almost too solipsistic for an audience. Then, after what seems like an eternity, Eleanor delivers about three minutes of killer routine that bring the house down. It's no less an act, but if that rigour could be harnessed to shape the entire performance, the results could be helplessly good. Until Sat PETER CRAWLEY

I'm So Close It's Not Even Funny **

Players Theatre

"There's nothing in the universe to suggest any purpose for humanity," says Max, which is a sobering thought to come from a goldfish. But as Troels Hagen Findsen floats onstage, in speedos and rubber ring, something about this physical-philosophical jumble from Canada's Theatre Why Not feels a little fishy. A grab-bag of themes are spluttered out within a deliberately haphazard introduction: time, technology and astronomy. But, despite some arresting sequences - the windswept dash of Hagen's homo exhausticus, the iceberg peaks that rise magically from Katrina Bugaj's bedsheets or the moving correspondence between drifting lovers via Instant Messager - the guiding star here is to wring the company's Jacques Lecoq training for all it's worth. Unlike the Lecoq-ery of Sabooge or Attic People, too often this feels like class exercises, with mop-top archaeologists, fey love songs and a conclusion requiring a high threshold for whimsy. Otherwise, it's not even funny. Until Sun PETER CRAWLEY

The Woman Who Left Herself ****

The Common Place

Up the ivy-strewn stairs there is a birthday celebration going on. The candles have yet to be blown out, but the party is definitely over. The Woman Who has Left Herself is in a meditative mood, raking over the embers of her 30-year past as her former self - or her future self? - look on.

The top-floor artist's studio at No 10 Burgh Quay is an intimate and atmospheric setting for this half-hour-long installation from Jouissance Productions. Under the subtle direction of Louisa Carroll, ethereal Sorcha Kenny is both repressed live body and liberated video-self. "Loneliness is not for another person but for part of our selves that is missing," she intones, and the mood rings true. More visual art than theatre, this is a lovely, thought-provoking piece. Until Sun SARA KEATING

Wilde On *

Spiegeltent

With the portentousness of a Shakespearean melodrama, Wilde On explored the musical potential of Oscar Wilde's canon with surprisingly po-faced intent.

Built on a series of disjointed performances that shared barely a nod in Wilde's direction, and a decision to ignore the acoustic and performance challenges of the Spiegeltent's theatre in the round, there was little to engage the audience in this marathon affair. Kíla piper Eoin Dillon opened with a nod to Wilde's father, The Broken Spectacle, and David Turpin sang of a Date With The Devil with a vampishness worthy of Marc Almond. In between, there were workmanlike contributions from Rob Cunningham, Si Schroeder and The Jimmy Cake, but Diet of Worms's attempt to explore the comedy of juxtaposing Wilde with Emily Dickinson in a battle for a book deal creaked with every forced pun. A leaden concoction all round. Show concluded SIOBHÁN LONG