This is Lynn Ruth Miller: a 75-year-old comic performer, who strips. An author, US-based Ms Miller is launching a career as a cabaret star with an act that combines stand-up comedy with singing and storytelling — oh, and stripping. In her show, Ageing is Amazing, which was a major hit at last year’s Edinburgh festival, 5 ft Ms Miller emerges to the tune of Strip Polka before peeling off several items of clothing to be left standing in front of the audience dressed in elaborate underwear, decorated with feathers, bells and a fringe.

Having brought her act to London and, more recently, The Quadrant at the Brighton Festival, she is now looking to take it to other venues across the UK. “I am making fun of little old ladies that think they are hot and sexy,” she tells People. “I don’t have a problem with getting older.

“You have a different outlook — you are not as needy. Older people shouldn’t try to be how they used to. It’s better not to kvetch.”

Ms Miller’s stage career began around six years ago after she enrolled in a comedy college course. She has since burst out of a giant birthday cake wearing stockings, sat on audience members’ laps, and been dubbed the Joan Rivers of fringe comedy. “As I’ve got older, I’ve got less inhibited. I don’t feel threatened and I have redefined what a good time is.” She adds: “The older I get, the more unusual I seem to be. Young guys come to see the show. I expect them to leave, but they love it.”

Ms Miller, who lives in San Francisco, will be performing at the Edinburgh festival this summer.