THE FEAR OF 13 Previews

I sadly won’t see this, but this does sound fascinating. 

BWAY Baby2 said: "Got a front row ticket for March 31- only 196. I could have gone with Blusters-- or Becky Shaw--- or this- and chose Fear of 13- I hope I enjoy it- Brody is- of course- a phenomenal actor."

“Only 196”. When we’re okay with tickets priced at only 196, that’s pretty tragic, but yeah, when Little Shop of Horrors is charging $400 off Broadway, anything goes, I guess. 

Little weird - the website says 1:45 runtime without an intermission, but Telecharge says an even 2 hours with an intermission. 

Brody's understudy is Ben Thompson, and Eboni Flowers covers for Tessa Thompson. 

 

Updated On: 3/19/26 at 05:51 PM

rest assured when people see the show they will post about it lol

Updated On: 3/19/26 at 10:47 PM

On reddit there is 1 positive review.  And 3 "luke warm" / negative reviews.

Well we shelved all the Lindsey Ferrentino into one season at least...

Lucky Mom2 said: "The show was fantastic - captivating, entertaining. Adrien Brody is so charismatic and professional, Tessa Thompson was wonderful too. We laughed often, cried a bit, thoroughly enjoyed.

It did run for just over 2 hours with no intermission, totally made sense with this story."

Was going to ask about run time, the internet said hour 45, was hoping to maybe see a 1 PM and a 3PM, but if it's lasting 2 hours probably not worth it

Thank you InTheBathroom1 for your review and especially the direct address / narration details. This will keep me far, far away. I can watch documentaries from the comfort of my couch. It’s hard for me to feel anything with someone talking at me. Sorry to miss Tessa.

I thought it was okay. Not a big fan of exposition heavy shows, but it does make some sense here in that the character has a penchant for speech. The perspective shift was quite interesting but I felt they could make better use of it and there's a lot of lost potential there. My biggest gripe is that as someone who actually volunteered at DOCCS, the play's portrayl of the COs to me was laughably comical and made it apprarent to me that the production did not bother to do real research. There was a prison strike last year across the state of NY. One of the COs I talked with before the strike told me that they had already worked 20 hours for their shift. In prison towns like Auburn, (most) people don't get the job because they are power hungry. They get the job because it was one of the only reasonably good paying jobs they have access to. They, too, are overworked and victims of the current criminal legal system. 

chrishuyen said: "How does the exposition/direct address compare to that of Punch?"


It’s waaaay more digestible than Punch and you don’t have to listen to those horrifically bad accents.

I’m honestly extremely torn about this because it there is certainly a compelling story to be told here, but it’s buried beneath a sludge of talky soap-operatic melodrama, hokey jokes and plot holes that runs a whole two hours without intermission. I read some of the reviews from London and it feels like similar issues with verbosity - though in London, it was claustrophobic as Brody was surrounded on all sides, whereas here, the set is so expansive that it places emphasis on the collective of death row prisoners being shrunk into a dehumanized nothingness, and so once the focus shifts primarily to Brody and Thompson, they struggle to fill the dead air. In both cases, there was a feeling of arrest and an inability to escape the ennui of a tell-not-show approach to the story. Also, the fact that the show starts up with a group of prisoners Thompson is supposedly helping and then they just disappear/are never heard from again is frustrating. Maybe a brief line or side plot about one of them getting executed might raise the stakes a bit.

At this point, I think Lindsay Ferrentino’s Broadway career is dead in the water unless she finally realizes that adapting documentaries for the stage isn’t a winning game. Brody and Thompson try their best, but Brody’s Nick seems to just maintain a constant stream of humor as a coping mechanism. Thompson is essentially a set set piece for most of the first half until Nick goads her into opening up, beginning a rather unsettling union. The supporting players as prisoners, especially Ephraim Sykes (who gets a solo song to sing) are good with the material they have.

I’m going again at the end of April, so I wonder if there will be any substantial changes or evolution, but Cromer is likely now the second director in a season that Ferrentino has handed a lump of coal with the expectation they’ll make it into a diamond.

This didn't get many outright raves in London, but reactions from critics and those on the UK site were more positive than what's appearing here so far.  Interesting.