Trauma monologues were the curious trend of last year’s Fringe, and now it’s time for neurodivergence to take the spotlight. Stuart Laws may not be leading the pack with Has To Be Joking? but his light hour on an adult diagnosis of autism acts both as an accessible primer on the subject and as a way for him to integrate this newly understood element of his personality into his routine. 

Cue plenty of offbeat jokes about dating, vasectomies, open relationships and globe-trotting, with the added twist of autistic coping mechanisms like stimming, masking and avoiding eye contact, flinging some extra spice onto his gentle and off-kilter wit. He’s long been an intelligent and incisive comic, although it’s easy to feel that he’s still skirting across the surface of a fresh diagnosis. Whether he’ll dig deeper in later shows remains to be seen; Laws won’t be short of laughs either way. 

Stuart Laws Has To Be Joking?, Monkey Barrel The Hive, until 25 August, 4.45pm; picture: Ed Moore.