RACE, sexuality, unemployment and finding your purpose in life aren¹t exactly the usual topics for a puppet show ­ but then Avenue Q isn¹t exactly your usual show.

Set in a fictional area of New York, Avenue Q bears more than a passing resemblance to Sesame Street ­ right down to the cartoon inserts that appear periodically.

And with a cast of gaily-garbed human characters joined by Muppet-style monsters operated by dourly dressed puppeteers, you could be fooled into thinking the show¹s for kids. But you would be very, very wrong.

Avenue Q¹s a lewd, crude and an absolute blast, packed with hilarious showstoppers like It Sucks To Be Me ­ even the slight technical difficulties work in its favour when there¹s a brief mic failure during Schadenfreude, a song about enjoying the misfortune of others.

Particular credit has to go to Rachel Jerram for her performance as Kate Monster and Lucy The Slut. She hardly misses a beat as she switches between voicing the two puppets ­ often mid-conversation ­ and dramatically changes her body language to convey two very different characters.

Avenue Q is a riotous night of no-strings puppet fun that you¹d be well advised to check out. Show runs at the Millennium Centre until June 18