Belltable Unfringed

Various venues, Limerick Ends Jan 31 Various times, All tickets €10 061-319866

Thirteen might be unlucky for some. But as Limerick’s Unfringed Festival enters the first of its teenage years it remains committed to staging new and original work, creating an annual celebration of performance shot through with good fortune and hard effort. In previous years, Unfringed shows have gone on to make an impact through the country and beyond – such as Corn Exchange’s Foley or Bickerstaffe’s Rap Éire. This year, across a compact five-day programme of theatre, comedy and music, some standout contributions include Memory Deleted, a site-specific venture (above) from Anu Productions in the Boutique Hotel, with Asylum’s puppetry-dance-detergent fusion, Cleaner, also straying beyond theatrical confines.

Site-specific productions make a virtue out of necessity – Belltable performances take place in Cecil Street while its O’Connell Street venue is being refurbished – but that modest blackbox stage hosts Elena Bolster’s intriguing Beast (a recent Edinburgh success that is part poem, part play), and Darren Maher’s new “stand up tragedy”, Spinal Krapp, while frenetic clowns Cirque de Légume leave the floor scattered with the pleasing aftermath of a grocery store massacre.

Can’T See ThaT? CaTch This

Haunted, The Gaiety Theatre, Dublin