For decades now, Jo Randerson has been one of Aotearoa’s most distinctive theatrical voices, a polymath whose work sits somewhere between punk poetry, clown logic and social critique. Speed is Emotional, their latest piece with Barbarian Productions, arrives with a reputation already forming around it: funny as hell, vulnerable and a celebration of neurodivergence that refuses to sit quietly.

Randerson frames the show clearly from the outset. This is a piece about ADHD, about being a child and parenting with ADHD, and about the emotional terrain of living in a world calibrated for neurotypical pacing. So we are primed to share the space with someone who has found theatre the only place where they can be at “full intensity” and learn more about their late diagnosis.

The Meteor was nearly full on the afternoon I attended, the audience warm and primed to enjoy themselves. And enjoy themselves they did. Randerson’s high‑energy, rapid‑fire delivery – the kind that ricochets between anecdotes, pop‑culture references, and sudden emotional pivots – consistently landed. They joke about their own projecting voice, but the clarity is real: even at full speed, the storytelling remains intelligible, which is no small feat given the density of ideas and the sheer speed of the performance.

The show cultivates understanding and comes with reminders that accessibility is not a design feature but a relational one. So it’s fitting that this performance at The Meteor uniquely includes NZSL signer Pollyana Fergson, whose interpretation is not merely functional but fully integrated into the show, and adds nuance and humour in clever ways to make this a genuinely deaf-inclusive show. It’s rare to see access woven so confidently into the aesthetic fabric of a show.

The show itself is a kind of controlled detonation through sensation and metaphor, with Randerson moving rapidly through childhood memories, costumes, rhythmic gymnastics and karaoke (singing, we’re told, helps calm the limbic system). By contrast, Elliot Vaughan, calm and grounded, holds his side of the stage like a counterweight – part prop master, part musician, part straight man – catching whatever Randerson throws his way. The contrast between Randerson, Ferguson and Vaughan’s energies feels deliberate and effective.

To watch this show is to have a light shone on ADHD and its incidentals. Who hasn’t woken with a brain already racing, or felt like the other half of a conversation was happening in slow motion? So a refrain from Randerson emerges: “Is that ADHD, or is that just being human?” Randerson’s articulation of hyperfocus, hypervigilance and the loneliness of masking is sharp and often funny, combined with the satirical bite that has long been Randerson’s signature.

To wear a neurotypical hat for a moment: for all the clarity of intention and excellent work happening here, the structure and delivery feel looser than I want. Speed Is Emotional races through its 90 minutes – a testament to Randerson’s (and the team’s) creative ability and frankly cardiovascular skills – yet I find its lack of tempo changes mutes my emotional response. The heaviest moments, including those touching on death, arrive and depart without the depth or stillness that might allow them to land more effectively. And while Randerson talks a mile-a-minute, I started to get distracted by the number of ums and ahs – not that they suggested a loss of place, but they do give the delivery a less polished feel than perhaps I expected. I can see the shape of what the show is reaching for – from diagnosis to understanding to reclamation – but it doesn’t quite come together in a way I find affecting. The messiness and speed feel intentional – obviously – and a terrific embodiment of the ADHD experience, but it sometimes clashes with my want for a more deliberately paced performance and a tighter narrative weave.

This is not to say the show lacks craft. The design team have created a world that is fluid and playful; the fabric set and costumes become hiding places and landscape, and characters unto themselves. And the finale, in which Randerson is joined by partner Thomas LaHood and their two sons for a musical sequence, is undeniably charming and sincere.

The audience around me responds with enthusiasm: laughter, applause, a sense of being carried along by the show’s momentum. Speed is Emotional is an important work. It brings ADHD stories to the stage with humour, honesty, and a refusal to apologise for intensity.

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Jo Randerson takes the stage in low-key clown persona; a kind of mask, since masking is one of the themes at issue in this portrayal of their experience of ADHD. This is a show, Jo claims, about time and art. They ease into their story, casually, as if saying whatever comes into their head, throwing a garishly coloured ball from hand to hand to evoke the way thoughts ping into and around their brain. Bright, clashing colours and props, left-field audio samples and psychedelic projections ping back and forth in an immersive elaboration on this theme, while Jo muses and segues and changes direction and throws random quips at Elliot Vaughan, who is managing the AV as well as various stage duties while deftly fielding Jo’s repartee.

With humour and a moving vulnerability, Jo’s storytelling celebrates the differences, gifts and richness of living with the “ADHD brain”, while simultaneously revealing the trials and loneliness of surviving in a world built for the neurotypical: the frustrations in trying to slow down to a pace others are comfortable with, the feeling of being emotionally “too much for people”, the extreme absorption of hyperfocus, the overwhelmingness of hypervigilance, of having no filter and being assaulted by every detail: “Everything’s popping at me like it’s fluoro”; the time agnosis, where heightened emotion distends one’s sense of passing time: “For me, intensity of emotion is the same as duration.”

The portrayal grows increasingly complex in playful sensory metaphor, rapid-fire pop-culture references, sudden digressions into Greek myth, mediaeval fantasy and reminiscences about Jo’s mother, demonstrations with neon-coloured props, masks and costume changes, and constant associative thought jumps. Comparisons of brain types, complete with projected scan images, lead into literary parallels. The neurotypical brain is like a novel, whereas the ADHD brain is a poem, Jo suggests; quick, non-linear, cryptic.

Watching this is like stumbling alongside Jo on a spontaneous, daft, chaotic, neon-coloured ramble through the woes and wonders and dysregulation of neurodivergence. The constant shifts and surprises are delightful – especially as formerly invisible cast members/loved ones appear onstage – but relentless. The narrative is running ahead of you like the hare at the greyhound race, to use Jo’s metaphor. But patterns emerge in a way that feels instinctive, almost accidental – repetitions, echoes, reintegrations. Not to mention Jo’s frequent bursts of illustrative song (at twice the tempo) at relevant moments. A raw, poetic cadence resolves out of the narrative; clever, painfully funny, human. This is an inspiring, emotionally eloquent work.

Copyright © in the review belongs to the reviewer

I enjoyed and appreciated Jo Randerson’s Speed is Emotional and you will too. It’s unique, and you really should see it. The season plays through until 03 May in the Q Theatre Loft, so you’ve no excuse. Book now.

My ancient Mum used to say I was a creature of habit. This was seventy plus years ago but I think her view holds true today. Today, though, she’d have a name for what I am – what I exhibit as ‘behaviour’ – and I’d be on some spectrum or other, with Robert F Kennedy Jnr, in his new role as Trump’s Flat Earther in Chief (Health), promising new research to prove his, as yet unspecified, theory that I’m actually neuro-perverse, that he’s found a miraculous cure, and that the pig’s entrails he consulted say he’ll have it all done by September.

Until then, I guess I’ll just plod along, that weird kid from Room 4 over by the incinerator, who collects acorns, alphabetises them, and lays them out in chronological order under his desk.

This ‘creature of habit’ traditionally ends her reviews with an opinion and a recommendation but today she’s chosen to start that way, may continue being ‘out of order’, and life may never be the same (at least for her) ever again.

Fair to say, it’s all Jo Randerson’s fault.

Why? Because last evening I attended – and consumed – Jo Randerson’s Speed is Emotional. It follows most of the theatrical conventions – a beginning, a middle, an end, a narrative, characters, sets, and all the trappings. Music even. And AV. It’s different though because, for me anyway, the beginning wasn’t at the beginning, the end wasn’t at the end, and the middle just kept happening, enveloping us in its difference and in its emotional back and forth.

There’s an inner structure presented for us in slides with titles like ‘ADHD’ and ‘Shark DNA’ that allow us to slide in an out of the engrossing, and beautifully scribed, narrative.

I want to say it’s ‘autobiographical’ so I look that up and Merriam Webster tells me that autobiographical is ‘of, relating to, or being an autobiography’ which is not that helpful. Nor is ‘in the style of or based on an autobiography’, but eventually I hit paydirt with ‘of, relating to, or influenced by one’s life or past personal experiences.’  So, Speed is Emotional is autobiographical, and as such it tells the story of Jo in ways that are often cripplingly funny, achingly painfilled, and deeply, deeply personal.

And informative.

As personal as anything I’ve ever experienced.

We learn that, when Jo’s son was diagnosed with ADHD, much of what was said about him felt, to Jo, ‘awfully relatable’.

I get this.

When my lad was diagnosed – age eleven – with Asperger’s syndrome, the psychologist said it was often hereditary and I joked that he clearly didn’t get it from my wife who is as ‘normal’ as a normal thing, and everyone in the room immediately looked at me. Was it because I’d said something tasteless?

Apparently not.

So, I did some research and, voila, not just a naughty dumb kid at all, more like a kid who had struggled with a challenge that hadn’t yet been invented.

I learned that people with Asperger’s syndrome/autism often possess average to above-average intelligence – my son is on the 98^th percentile – and they may exhibit a deep interest in specific subjects, sometimes to the level of expertise. My son is a double sporting international – archery and karate – in sports that require frequent repetitive behaviour and a strict adherence to routine. Despite these strengths, some may struggle with understanding social cues, metaphorical language, and nonverbal communication.

I asked my lad about his diagnosis, and he said, ‘it’s my gift’, and went back to playing Minecraft, or Pokémon, or some such game at which he is most definitely, an expert.

Who’d be a parent?

Jo would.

Me too.

So, why does this matter? Because, if this can happen to me, it can equally happen to you, and it’s important that you start with accurate information. Jo Randerson’s Speed is Emotional gives you that information and personalizes it in the most wonderful – and intimate – way.

It turns out that Jo also has ADHD and, rather than shying away from it, they have embraced it as their ‘superpower.’

So, what do we need to know about ADHD to enjoy the show? Nothing really, but here goes anyway.

First, it’s a real thing. It’s a neurodevelopmental delay in a specific part of the brain, the part that’s responsible for filtering and control. It’s not willful naughtiness or laziness – that’s helpful – and it has nothing to do with intelligence. Just as there are differing levels of intelligence across the general population, so there are differing levels of intelligence in people with ADHD.

As happened in Jo’s case, diagnosis in adulthood often means gaining access to understanding yourself in a new and non-judgmental way that allows for adapting to changing situations, relationships, workplace requirements and life stages.

Thanks for that, ADHD New Zealand.

The upside is, that people with ADHD have increased energy levels, enthusiasm, creativity, intuition, sensitivity, and fun, and, you’ve guessed it, they’re more likely to become experts in their field.

No one could ever say that Jo Randerson isn’t an expert in the field of live performance,

‘Jo lives their life at ‘high voltage, with a brain that never stops and a fountain of restless energy fuelling their fiercely funny artistic voice. A true arts polymath, Jo has accumulated achievements, accolades and acclaim as a performer, comedian, writer, activist, director, curator, theatremaker, filmmaker, witch, and clown.’

Not my words but an accurate distillation of Jo’s CV.

In 2001, Jo founded Barbarian with partner Thomas LaHood who is also in the show. Thomas has been playing drums for six months, plays them in the penultimate part of the show, and does an excellent job.  

‘Barbarian is driven by a belief in radical fun, courageous expression, fluidity, generosity and participation’, and it is this ethos, we learn, that created, Speed is Emotional. It certainly has all those qualities. Jo ‘bares their soul’, shares the exhilaration, exhaustion, joy and absurdity of living and parenting with neurodiversity.

It’s an authentic claim, and evident throughout.

We watch as they ‘weave their punk poetic magic into a beautiful comedy about transcending labels and living with a voltage so high it’s going to blow the mains.’

‘Transcending labels?’ It’s true, but without the label in the first place, we have nothing to transcend.

Yep, Speed is Emotional. Randerson proves that. She zips along like a bat out of hell.

It’s an absolute sprint but, fortunately, there are a few ‘time out’ moments during which we meet a more reflective Jo, and we like that Jo very much. Not to say we don’t like manic Jo, fast Jo, we do, but we need the reflective moments to process everything else and her clever writing gives us these.

There are helpful performance signposts, anchors, expertly inserted by performance technician Elliot Vaughan who is a wonderful, empathic, adjunct to the action, and by the figures that intermittently appear from beneath the flowing silken set that make it seem like an ever-living thing, almost worthy of its own pronouns.

There are sublime segues that keep us hyper focused to avoid getting lost, not that this is likely as we’re happily riveted throughout. The predictable is matched by the seemingly random and we often find ourselves comfortably ensconced in leftfield as though it’s our natural habitat which its not.

Well, mostly not.

The fabric set is appropriately fluid and doubles as hiding place, cocoon, costume, and metaphor all at once.

It’s absolutely divine.

The actual costumes (Steven Junil Park) are also exceptional – timeless and practical, lighting (Bekky Boyce) is superb – complex and effective, and the AV (Kaleb Maunder) is outstanding.

Isobel MacKinnon’s direction, while being necessarily unobtrusive, gives a necessary structure when required

Just when I’d worked out what was going to happen next, it didn’t. The penultimate action devolved into a family musical performance featuring the combined multi-talents of the all-singing all-playing Randerson LaHood whānau – Geronimo LaHood, Caspar Randerson, Thomas LaHood, and Jo with expert support from musical director Elliot Vaughan on laptop and bass.

Applause and laughter suggest the fullish house were happily carried along by the musical performances and I was too. They were fun, beautifully rehearsed, at times exhilarating, and wonderfully real.

Jo Randerson ONZM (they/them) is among the best known and most respected theatre practitioners in Aotearoa New Zealand. Speed is Emotional is arguably their most courageous work to date addressing, first hand, their ADHD diagnosis and its impact on their life and the lives of those close to them.

On arrival at Q Theatre, after two days of severe weather warnings in the north, it was heartening to be welcomed by calm efficiency, the affirming smiles of Q staff, and a super stack of excellent show programmes.

I won’t deny that, as a long-time fan of Jo Randerson’s work, I’ve been anticipating experiencing this relatively new work for some weeks and, finally, here we are.

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