Which of these five dances is most worthy of £25,000? That is the question underlying this year’s Bloomberg-sponsored Place Prize.

Here’s how it works: Bloomberg generously coughs up £5,000 apiece for 20 British-based choreographers of varying backgrounds and experience to create new 15-minute productions. Five judges select what they deem to be the best four. The public votes in a fifth entry. After ten days of performances one dance-maker walks away with the jackpot.

The final round of the third biennial competition kicked off with a programme that seems weak and unexciting compared to the last two prize bills. The evening begins with Aletta Collins’s Lap Dancer, the winner of the popular vote. This showdown between a beleaguered office type and her laptop is a good showcase for the ever-watchable Rachel Krische. There are bright moments, but the single idea is overextended.

Similarly, Lorena Randi and Adam Linder give gutsy performances in the latter’s Foie Gras. But this cautionary kick at the dangers of consumer excess grinds on into increasingly grotesque territory.

Simon Ellis’s Gertrud, a shadowy, imaginary and quietly multimedia dialogue between him and a long-dead German choreographer, bravely goes out on a conceptual limb. Ellis cleverly couches criticism of the piece’s pretensions inside a disembodied running commentary from beyond the grave.

The final two dances offer contrasting views on our animal nature. In Anna Williams’s Clearing, Petra Söör and Hannah Shepherd (both excellent) prowl about a bare stage like low-key lionesses. The well-crafted tensions inside their relationship convey a telling ambiguity that makes Dam Van Huynh’s sweaty male trio Collisions seem blunt.

Set to Lee J. Malcolm’s live electronic score, this homoerotically charged training session for would-be gladiators is blisteringly performed. And it won the nightly prize, voted by the audience, of £1,000. But does it merit £25,000 more? I’d opt for Williams or Ellis. But time, and the judges, will tell.

Ends Sept 27 2008. Box office: 020-7121 1100 (www.theplaceprize.com)

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