JOHNNY'S ART TO SWITCH OFF

Comic says sculpture helps him calm mind when ADHD goes into overdrive

- BY SARAH WALLIS

JOHNNY Vegas has ADHD, a disorder that he says means his mind works in overdrive, going from one crazy, random thought to another like someone channel-hopping on TV.

If we want to know how that feels, here is a rundown of what might go through his brain at any one time...

He says: "I'm driving a tugboat, the next thing I'm having my tonsils out, then I'm thinking I should learn to cook, then I wonder why we've no poisonous snakes in England.

"If I went to night school could I mend a pinball machine? How many seagulls would it take to lift me?"

It sounds hilarious, but also exhausting, so little surprise that it led to a "meltdown" that kept him out of the public eye for a year while he got help with his mental health.

In the two-part Channel 4 documentary, Johnny Vegas: Art, ADHD And Me, he tells how his love of art brought him back from the brink.

Johnny, who was married to Irish TV presenter Maia Dunphy, from 2011 to 2020 says: "I went into meltdown, I couldn't function. It seemed insurmountable. I had to get professional help. This has been the most difficult part of my life.