Something about burlesque brings out my inner Jane Austen. Is there really anything post-ironic about stripping and nipple tassels? I find myself wondering.

And the innuendo is so tired and boastful. Often performers seem to be saying to the audience: "Look at us, we're so much cooler and more risqué than you."

So I approached Miss Behave's alternative cabaret night with some caution. But from the moment ringmaster Amy Saunders (aka Ms Behave) came on stage, I knew we were in safe hands.

Dressed like Betty Boop in a skintight red PVC dress, she has the fruity voice of a head girl.

The Roundhouse has been transformed into an intimate cabaret-style environment with red velvet curtains and café-style tables (though whether you ever get your drinks is the running joke of the evening).

Saunders, the show's resident sword swallower, welcomes her punters, steals their margaritas and stops the evening from ever tipping over into theatre of cruelty. It's playful and very gay-friendly - but generosity is the hallmark of the evening.

Even the truly filthy moments - Petra who can smoke a cigarette between her thighs; the amusingly named Bret Pfister with his eye-watering aerial hoop act - are full of irony and self-ridicule. This is fetish with a big heart.

Marjo Nantel - the Amelie of contortionists - dazzles with her silken aerobatics (performed to Björk's All Is Full of Love). Kalki Hula Girl is a wonderful parody of the Britney Spears school of white-trash entertainment.

Aesthete Dusty Limits (a ringer for Dorian Gray) pushes the boundaries of neo-Weimar cabaret.

Physical-comedy stars Spy Monkey perform a send-up of extreme pole dancing - dressed as Crusaders, they gyrate and strip to Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet (and it's the girl who gets to keep her clothes on).

You can suspend any ideas of hierarchy: even the riggers and technicians take to the high wire. And the costumes are fabulous, especially flame-haired Lucifire's 1950s-style couture.

I admit the gross-out comedy thrilled me less. And, while the younger audiences lapped up crooner Frank Sanazi (and his Rat Pack-style Songs for Swingin' Dictators), I noticed older Jewish couples exchanging thoughtful glances.

But at best Miss Behave is a living embodiment of Angela Carter's Nights at the Circus. Book a table with friends and take a night off from the credit crunch

Until 24 August. Box office: 0844 482 8008, www.roundhouse.org.uk