Edinburgh Fringe comedy review

Is this a tender and touching account of what it’s like to be the mother of a severely autistic child at the most challenging time of their development – or is it a very elaborate hour-long knob gag?

Brilliantly, Josephine Lacey’s debut is both, as she offers an unfiltered look at what it was like to guide her neurodivergent 17-year-old son through puberty. Or, in her words, ‘taught him how to wank’. The things we do for our children…

Autism Mama is a revelatory glimpse into an area many of us will never experience while offering some comradeship to anybody who’s in the same peculiar boat. And while this is a storytelling hour rather than the gag-gag-gag of stand-up, her situation is funny purely for being so extreme, and she exploits that expertly.

Lacey’s comic sensibilities have inured her to any delicacies around the issue and her tell-it-like-it-is approach is hugely appealing, just another harried mother having to put herself out for the sake of an unappreciative teenager. 

She bursts on to the stage full of confidence and brio, in full compere mode, injecting energy with some quick jokes about herself and her family. That way, we come to learn about her son and his sensory processing disorder, which makes him very anxious when in unfamiliar territory. He also has echolalia (repeating back other people’s words) and is a musical savant with perfect pitch.

Lacey doles out credit to those who help him through the world, but when it came to his sexual awakening she felt for the first time that she wasn’t on the same page as his school and needed – for want of a better phrase – to take matters into her own hands.

Plenty of laughs are to be had from the discomfort of the situation – obviously – and they are heightened by just how at ease Lacey is with every aspect if the story, committed to telling it with honesty. 

There are a surprising number of resources dedicated to helping mums in her situation, and the comedian takes us through the ‘social stories’ used to help her son understand his new desires. These are picture book explanations of what the adolescent body is experiencing and how to deal with it, which Lacey guides us through. This is the most straightforward section of the hour – there’s little added comedy value beyond simply showing us what the books say, and the routine goes on too long.

Other than this, however, the show strikes a fine balance between dirty jokes and making the audience empathise with the challenges of her situation, which she tackles with love but, more amusingly, resigned pragmatism. 

And there is an ultimate heartache in that Lacey will never know how her son experiences the world. However, what shines through these dick jokes with purpose is a mother who will do whatever it takes to equip her son for the challenging world. Even teaching him to masturbate.

Review date: 1 Aug 2024
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: Pleasance Courtyard