Petrushka himself is a beautiful creation, gangling and mischievous, with a hint of haughty loneliness lurking behind his rouged nose and grimy joey frills. By some eerie brilliance, his clownish dance is composed of inch-perfect muscular tensions and extensions. The physical reality of this haunted, hopeless creature; the trembling leg that supports an impossible aerial arabesque; the satisfyingly weighted stamp of his gawky, gambolling love-dance, are all impeccably imagined and executed. His scarlet-frocked lady-love is commonplace by comparison, a provincial Venus with well-fleshed legs, vacantly complacent in her pirouetting. Even the moustachioed strong-man with his crowd-pleasing routine of muscle-flexing and sword-swallowing can’t compete with Petrushka’s wan intensity.

But if the puppets (designed by Lyndie Wright , manipulated by Ronnie Le Drew, Mandy Travis and Rebekah Wild) are amazing, the rest of the show isn’t without its problems. There’s far too much text, too much scene-setting, too much explanation and too many real bodies getting in the way of the puppets and their story.

Things do pick up pace in the second act, as the runaway Petrushka embarks upon a jaunt to Switzerland to ‘help’ a beleaguered Mr. Stravinsky with his efforts to write a new ballet. And here Josh Darcy, who’s far too genial to be remotely convincing as the wicked puppet-master, excels as Petrushka’s willing stooge. The unashamedly immature gags that litter this brief partnership are greeted with howls of ecstasy by the kids in the audience (who apparently prefer slapstick, silliness and the occasional blown raspberry to any amount of doomed love). But it’s doomed love they get, as we’re swept back to St. Petersburg where Petrushka plays out the final scenes of his doleful drama.

Petrushka is an ambitious conglomeration of jokes, dance, music, tragedy and magic tricks. Craftmanship and love are evident in every puppet, prop and gesture, and the show is indisputably strong on atmosphere, if – as a flurry of programme-consulting in the interval attested – less strong on clarity and focus. Will your five-year-old love it? I’m not making any promises. But I suspect that Petrushka’s uncanny dance will be staying with me for some time to come.

The narrative moves briskly, Juliet Larkin’s text and Ronnie Le Drew’s production relying upon our familiarity with the fable to keep exposition to a minimum. If I felt slightly deprived of a full mouse and broom pas de deux (a la Frederick Ashton’s Cinderella), this was more than made up for by a delicate divertissement of twirling cavaliers and their ladies, rodent clowns, tumblers and even (brilliantly) a troupe of mouse puppeteers.

This downplaying of Cinderella’s sentimental baggage is probably a smart option given the show’s target audience (ages 3+), who’re much more interested in knockabout comedy, and are mightily pleased by each opportunity to shout out, join in and try tiny footwear for size. They’re also enraptured by Lyndie Wright’s appealing sturdy puppet creations, while older spectators are more likely to be tickled by the sleight-of-hand necessary to allow a usually legless glove-puppet to try on that miniscule magic slipper.

Grown-ups are also more likely to appreciate the rather marvellous conceit of making Cinders (a clockmaker’s daughter, remember) responsible for deciding whether the palace clock ever will sound the fateful note of midnight. The lonely moment between the strokes of eleven and twelve, when our heroine has to decide between her father’s interests and her own, is a neat and very smart addition to the story. As is the smashing of that crucial shiny shoe, a development that requires Cinders’ prince to recognise his beloved solely on the evidence of his beady black eyes.

These subtleties are largely ignored by Cindermouse’s youthful target-audience who are, however, properly and vocally impressed by the friendly showmanship of puppeteers Roger Lade and Andrea Sadler. It’s hard not to be impressed by a show that handles a demanding crowd so deftly, charming kids and adults alike, without ever seeming to try too hard.

Our compère for the evening is Baby Warhol: a deadpan, belligerent and unclothed baby dolly and self-proclaimed guru, floating inside a gilt frame. He’s supported by Chris Cresswel, gaunt, weird and creepy, demonstrating an unwholesome ability to terrorise the audience into collective interpretive dance.

Kate Brehm’s virtual toy theatre presents a hand-drawn episode from Alice in Wonderland, all the more magical because we can see exactly how she’s doing it. The Woman with No Mouth, Chloe Roach’s fabric-based animation, offers a daring and ever-so-slightly appalling exploration of an obsession with violent self-fashioning. And Robert Bidder’s Jumper Eggs (eggshells hand painted in the manner of significant items of knitwear) provides a beautiful, whimsical, offbeat interlude.

Florian, a cut-out animation from Andrew Gibbs and Zosienka, is a sepia-toned fairy tale about the fatal meeting of two lovers on a bridge, with a meticulous eye for environmental detail and infused by a strain of mordant wit. It’s like something a Pre-Raphaelite painter might have hit upon in a moment of unaccustomed giddiness – an absolute atmospheric delight.

Then Clementine the Living Fashion Doll (managed by Mark Mander) stars in her own battily glamorous addition to the Indiana Jones franchise. And Spank the Dancing Monkey (ably assisted by Iestyn Evans and Andy Heath) gives a moving, manic account of the vicissitudes of being a monkey minus an organ grinder.

If you haven’t been to the Little Angel, then get it sorted. Seriously. It’s one of the few theatres in London where I can’t remember ever being disappointed by a show. And Puppet Grinder Cabaret demonstrates why this might be so: a marvellous melange of fantastical stories, outrageous characters and unabashed eccentricity, imagined and orchestrated by some scarily talented folk. As Baby Warhol so rightly snarls: “This is art”. And I’m not going to argue with the guru.