The Clerk that wouldn't Sink, The Graves that would not hold...

Mixing the familiar patter of street slang with fluid rhyming couplets, 'Two Graves' is exquisitely structured. It captures sordid detail and doomed enthusiasm, never allowing the pace to slacken.
Two Graves is a monologue exploring the corrosive power of vengeance, set in a London underworld fueled by illegal gambling and violence. Paul Sellar's forceful script dances through back-room darts' tournaments, fixed horse-races and murderous despair: Jonathan Moore's performance is remarkable for its lack of movement. He recites the extended poem from a chair, transfixing the audience with a vicious stare and harsh delivery.

Mixing the familiar patter of street slang with fluid rhyming couplets, 'Two Graves' is exquisitely structured. It captures sordid detail and doomed enthusiasm, never allowing the pace to slacken.

From the barest bones of a predictable plot- a young man sucked gradually into a sinister East End- Sellar's rhymes evoke the excitement of dubious sports and gangster turf wars. Moore manages to bring out the abject misery of his protagonist's situation, and the suggestive soundtrack heightens the tension.

If the finale is unoriginal, and the characters owe a great deal to the cliches of British gangster cinema, this remains ferocious, arresting theatre, made all the more potent by its lack of props, set and theatrical devices.

Working as a series of excellent sketches and a coherent narrative, the play brusquely reaches a conclusion that is ambiguously hopeful.

The Unsinkable Clerk gathers together fragments of the Old Testament, a stereotypical officer-worker

and pagan sea-gods into a modern parable, charting the redemption of an ordinary man through an extraordinary adventure. The two actors take on a huge variety of roles, from a decrepit Poseidon through to the prophet Jonah, using mime, imagination and crisp dialogue. The story is simple- a clerk finds his routine of quiet conformity and emotional repression disrupted by the intrusion of a magical flood, and struggles to find paradise. It is told with charm and surreal cartoon humour.

Both playful and resonant, The Unsinkable Clerk sees the hero, Mr Pumley, enticed and tormented by visions of pleasure and desire, sustained by his love for a shop-girl and his companion Jonah. Much of the laughter comes from the people that Mr Plumley encounters, and the actors leap between roles with ease and alacrity, fleshing out characters in deft gestures. Working as a series of excellent sketches and a coherent narrative, the play brusquely reaches a conclusion that is ambiguously hopeful.

The script is tight and literary; the performances assured. The dynamic use of minimal props and set encourages suspension of disbelief. Although it lacks an epic scale, this is an excellent,immediate and profound show: deep but not heavy, witty but not relying on cheap gags.

Remember When? Nor Do I.

A pair of female Sloans eulogise working-class pastimes, a couple of dumb presenters sell increasingly useless products and bursts of radio urge the purchase of mundane items to the lowest common denominator: all performed with vigour but made wearisome by repetition.
Godliman and Lane are competent comedy actors, interspersing their show with video and audio clips and persistently attacking mindless television, manipulative advertising and patronising media personalities. If their targets are easy and caricatured, rather than closely observed and original, they still maintain energy and a rapid pace.

The most imaginative sketch is the self-referential finale, a video of celebrities endorsing their show, but too often Godliman and Lane exaggerate their satire, expanding solid ideas into absurdity until they lose their bite, or repeating a theme into predictability. A pair of female sloans eulogise working-class pastimes, a couple of dumb presenters sell increasingly useless products, and bursts of radio urge the purchase of mundane items to the lowest common denominator: all are performed with vigour but made wearisome by repetition.

There are plenty of belly-laughs and concise individual sketches. However, over an hour, the material is spread thin and only the variety of formats holds the attention. Godliman and Lane are promising, but this show feels like an audition rather than a fully-realised act, despite the savagery and bitterness beneath the amiable surface.

Braving a spontaneous show, he reveals quick wit and confidence: he builds an easy rapport,

supported by the crowd's enthusiasm.

Hampered by technical mishaps, Carey Marx cannot present his usual show, but he relies on a classic strategy: getting drunk and improvising. He serenades the audience, uses props and recycles gags, all the while commenting on his Edinburgh experiences and his own comedy processes.

His material is self-consciously shocking, attacking everyone from albinos to the disabled, carrying off outrageous jokes with wry charm. He discusses the challenges of being offensive- the biggest laughs in Scotland, he notes, clear a room in Canada- while his self-effacing warmth redeems his obnoxious observations. Braving a spontaneous show, he reveals quick wit and confidence: he builds an easy rapport, supported by the crowd's enthusiasm.

He is a masterful stylist, gracefully switching from surrealism to sardonic irony. His relaxed delivery avoids gratuitous nastiness, although his improvisations lurch between subjects and the set is fragmented. Rambling rants about 'political correctness' and the power of swearing are predictably dated, and the broken projector forces him to rely on old material: yet he holds attention for a genial hour. Marx's presence and imagination suggest that his full show could be outstanding.

He never adds anything to the essentials.

Covering three films in an hour, The One Man Star Ways Trilogy monologue is long on exposition but short on wit. A virtuoso performance and a remarkable feat of memory, it fails to connect emotionally.

Charlie Ross tears through the trilogy at break-neck pace, reducing the heroes into repeated gestures. With so much plot, there are few opportunities for humour beyond the obvious jokes about the subsequent movies or Darth Vader's racial identity. Confused scenes of flapping arms and kitsch posturing are never more than mildly amusing. Luke Skywalker, recast as a petulant teenager, provides a rare running gag, but most laughs come from Ross' physical interpretations of non-human characters.

Relying on the audience's knowledge of the films, the interpretation lacks imagination: the most charming sequences happen when he stops acting and reveals sweet enthusiasm. By 'Return of the Jedi', he loosens up and considers absurdities and the movies' context, yet he never adds anything to the essentials.

The crowd are delighted by the energy and grateful for the humour: the successes are due more to Star Wars' popularity than any creativity or poignancy.