Daniel Radcliffe has won magical reviews for his latest stage role as a disabled Irish dreamer in Martin McDonagh's The Cripple Of Inishmaan.

The former Harry Potter star plays the title role in a Michael Grandage-directed production of McDonagh's tragicomedy at London's Noel Coward Theatre.

First staged in 1996, the play is a raucously dark take on Irish identity and Daniel stars as Billy, a 17-year-old orphan on a remote island in 1930s Ireland, who sees a chance of escape from a life of boredom and mockery when an American film crew arrives on a neighbouring island to shoot a movie.

The Guardian's Michael Billington said the performance proved that Daniel "is a fine stage actor with a gift for playing social outsiders" while Times critic Libby Purves praised his "still, melancholy intensity and resolve".

In The Independent, Paul Taylor hailed the 23-year-old star's "honest, sensitive, unshowy performance" - though he said Daniel "may not have the most convincing Irish accent in Grandage's vividly quirky ensemble".

"Unlike many child stars, Daniel Radcliffe has grown up gracefully," said the Daily Telegraph's Charles Spencer, who thought "the former boy wizard lends this disconcertingly cruel play what little heart it has".

Daniel has taken on a series of challenging stage and screen roles as he's moved on from a decade as JK Rowling's magical hero.

His 2007 stage debut in Peter Shaffer's Equus required him to bare all, emotionally and physically. He made his Broadway debut singing and dancing in the musical How To Succeed In Advertising Without Really Trying.

His movie roles have included Beat poet Allen Ginsberg in Kill Your Darlings and a bereaved man who mysteriously grows devilish horns in Horns.

The Cripple Of Inishmaan, which runs to August 31, is part of a West End season of plays overseen by Grandage, who has assembled an A-list company of actors that includes Daniel, Ben Whishaw, Judi Dench and Jude Law.