An odd thing happened on the way to Avenue Q

The winsome Avenue Q is a little late in coming to the Citadel Theatre. The part puppet, part human musical first opened off Broadway in 2003.

But for many people laughing out loud at the irreverent Sesame Street satire during last Thursday’s opening night, it was well worth the wait.

Funny and well thought out by composer-lyricists Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx, Avenue Q is definitely not a children’s show.

Avenue Q is a crummy New York rundown brick tenement where people who cannot afford Avenue A look to rent an apartment. Here we meet Princeton (Andrew MacDonald Smith), an employed English Lit grad, who has had to lower his expectations while searching for a “Purpose” in life.

Princeton is the living embodiment of Gen X, a lost generation that discovered that the feel-good teachings of Sesame Street simply didn’t mesh with the cold-hard reality of life.

While apartment hunting, our aimless hero encounters Kate Monster (Rachel Bowron), a kindergarten teacher who has yet to teach a full day, but dreams of opening up a Monster-sorri school someday.

The other cute furry puppets are Rod (Andrew MacDonald-Smith), an uptight, closeted male banker and his affable roommate Nicky (Ryan Kelly). The duo is a complete riff on Bert and Ernie.

And then there’s Trekkie Monster (Ryan Kelly), a porn addict who bears a startling resemblance in both voice and character to Cookie Monster. And last but not least is the brassy, big-busted sex-goddess Lucy the Slut (Rachel Bowron), clearly a Miss Piggy duplicate.

There are also three human actors – Brian (Justin Bott), an unemployed unfunny comedian, his fiancĂ© Christmas Eve (Kimmy Choi), a therapist with only one patient and the down on-his-luck actor Gary Coleman (Saccha Dennis) forced to work as the building superintendant.

As the sassy puppets question what is going on in their lives, they touch on all sorts of subjects such as the value of education, dreams, romance, love and hate, masturbation, porn, sexual identity, racism, pornography, betrayal, commitment and growing up.

Yes, this mouthful of topics is covered in two hours through a number of self-explanatory songs that vary from It Sucks to Be Me and If You Were Gay to Everyone’s A Little Bit Racist and The Internet is for Porn.

While the songs sound as if they might be a drag, they are in fact, light, whimsical and bouncy, another ode to Sesame Street.

In this musical, the puppeteers manipulating a combination of hand and rod puppets are always visible. Although the puppeteers are dressed in neutral tones, they are front and centre. At first the eye darts back and forth between puppet and puppeteer, but after a while their movements blend together in perfect symmetry.

The puppeteers certainly deserve special kudos for their fluid manipulations even as their characters act, sing and dance. In particular MacDonald-Smith (Princeton/Rod) and Bowron (Kate/Lucy the Slut) deserve special mention for creating such charming characters. The explosive puppet sex scene between Princeton and Kate was certainly lapped up by the audience.

In a backhanded way, Avenue Q makes you reflect on life. But it’s mainly a night of adult whimsy and entertainment laced with a lot of racy one-liners. And if you’re not a puppet person, this show may just turn you into a convert.