ACCORDING to director Jon Potter there are two key elements to Company Paradiso’s third comedy showcase: laughter and being listened to.

Designed to coincide with World Mental Health Day Warning! May Contain Nuts! sees cult stand-up comic Simon Munnery and singer-songwriter Lorraine Bowen introduce performers with mental health issues delivering their own material.

The show’s genesis dates back to a series of workshops run by Company Paradiso in 2010 with mental health users.

“Company Paradiso’s mission is to help people tell their stories,” says Potter, who is also working on a cross-generational radio project involving grandparents and grandchildren.

“In the workshops we were having a good time and a lot of laughs – and we realised laughing was great medicine. We approached the Dome about putting on a performance in October for World Mental Health Day and they put us in touch with the comedy festival.”

The show is staged every two years because of funding issues.

The material, which ranges from poetry to true life observations about trying to get a ticket from a railway ticket machine, is put together through a series of workshops.

“This year there is material about cutbacks and the recession,” says Potter. “Some people feel the recession is over, but in terms of the effect it’s having it isn’t. We are closing down a lot of support networks and services.

“Many of the participants had a community psychiatric nurse for years and recently that post has been cut so they are on their own. People are more vulnerable and more tense – and that relates to more people being in hospital.”

That’s not to say Warning: May Contain Nuts! will be a polemic about the current political situation.

“It’s about finding the lighter side,” says Potter. “We have never had a problem finding people who can be very funny when they talk about their own lives. Because they have been through these experiences they have a licence to be funny about it.”

Warning: May Contain Nuts! 

Brighton Dome Studio Theatre, New Road, Sunday, October 12

Starts 5pm, tickets £8/£5. Call 01273 709709.