The Fear of 13 review – Adrien Brody is sensational in new era for the Donmar Warehouse

What a way to start your first season as the artistic director of the Donmar Warehouse.

Timothy Sheader, now able to programme shows that benefit from ceilings (after many, many years heading up Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre), has played a blinder by premiering Lindsey Ferrentino’s brand-new play The Fear of 13, based on the very true, very unbelievable story of Nick Yarris – a man sent to Death Row for a crime he doesn’t believe he’s committed.

Another coup for Sheader – taking on the role of Yarris is none other than Oscar winner Adrien Brody, making his London debut in the intimate 250-seat confines of the Donmar. Here, under the creative eye of director Justin Martin and designer Miriam Buether, the auditorium is transformed into the round – generating an oppressive, claustrophobic sense of confined space that is disarmingly flexible when required.

Ensconced in the Donmar alongside Yarris is, at first glance, a basket of so-called deplorables – a boilersuit-clad ensemble that multi-role their way through the decades of Yarris’ incarcerated life, with some equally unexpected yet marvellous quick-change work thanks to costume designer Brigitte Reifenstuel. Acting as the heart of the piece for the vast majority of the runtime is Nana Mensah as Yarris’ confidante Jackie, coaxing out Yarris’ truths and opening herself to him at the same time. Throw in dependably stellar work from lighting designer Jon Clark and sound designer Ian Dickinson and everything here is on fine form. Composer and music director DJ Walde helps oversee some of the show’s most stirring sequences.

Ferrentino’s script gallops with innovative charm where it could, quite easily, have trotted along with pedestrian paint-by-numbers storytelling. The result is a harder road to travel but one that reaps much greater rewards. She returns again and again to a question of time – years pass by in the blink of an eye, before heartbeats seem to stretch on for hours. Fleeting moments interacting with Jackie are worth weeks, even years of waiting to Yarris. How does time change when you know you might have little of it left, but so much you can’t fill it with?

Martin also directs his company with incredible finesse. Some characters flit by with the necessary glib humour, while others are alighted upon for poignant asides – Posi Morankiyo and Tommy Sim’aan in particular deliver a heartbreaking tale of doomed romance.

Brody is at first inscrutable but gradually lets Yarris unfurl like pages of a long-discarded leather-bound book. He leaps through the decades of the inmate’s life – both before and during Death Row – at one time even playing a nine year-old with heartbreaking fragility. One gung-ho prison-break anecdote would only be less astounding if it wasn’t actually true.

He’s matched for large swathes of the play beat-for-beat by Mensah – detailing the agonising isolation that comes from falling for someone locked away, sentenced to death. The pair almost exist on two time streams, converging for fleeting moments of sizzling chemistry.

Martin previously tackled the theme of justice in Suzie Miller’s electrifying Prima Facie, winning Jodie Comer almost every stage award going. Here, it’s the justice system once more in the spotlight, prised apart through the shocking reality of a haunting lived experience.

There’s nothing to be gained from revealing the conclusion of Yarris’ story here – in fact for those who aren’t aware of the saga, it’d almost be better waiting to experience it live (though David Sington’s documentary on the same subject is also worth a watch). Rest assured however, this will go down as one of the best new plays of the year. Sheader couldn’t have kicked off his tenure with a more thrilling premiere.