Last March, Adrien Brody took the stage of the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles to claim the best-actor Oscar for his performance in The Brutalist. A year later, the actor will make his Broadway debut in Lindsey Ferrentino’s The Fear of 13—with Tessa Thompson, hotly tipped this awards season for her turn in Nia DaCosta’s Hedda, starring opposite him. Previews of the production, directed by David Cromer (Good Night, and Good Luck; this season’s Bug), begin at the James Earl Jones Theatre on March 19, with an opening night set for April 15.
Based on David Sington’s 2015 documentary of the same name, The Fear of 13 tells the story of Nick Yarris (Brody), a man who spent more than 20 years on death row for crimes he maintained that he did not commit. (Thompson will play Jackie, a prison volunteer with whom Nick forms a profound—and lasting—connection.) The show had its world premiere at London’s 250-seat Donmar Warehouse in the fall of 2024, a staging directed by Justin Martin (Prima Facie) that also starred Brody (who earned an Olivier nomination for his lead turn).
When Sarah Crompton profiled Brody for Vogue’s winter 2025 issue, he described how the play, his first in decades, had completely embedded itself in his brain. “I’m not really sleeping,” he said. “I wake up with dialogue from the play constantly in my thoughts.” Yet he’d also seen firsthand how gratifying the production was for Yarris—now an author—who often came to see it. “He shared with me how I have personally lifted away so much pain and suffering by helping to tell his story.” (The Fear of 13 will be presented in partnership with the Innocence Project, a nonprofit that has exonerated more than 250 wrongfully convicted inmates using scientific data.)
Needless to say, it’s shaping up to be another dazzlingly starry season in the New York theater. Thompson—who made her Off Broadway debut in a revival of Lydia R. Diamond’s Smart People a decade ago—can presently be seen in the Netflix limited series His Hers with Jon Bernthal, who will also make his Broadway debut this spring. He will appear in a stage adaptation of Dog Day Afternoon with Ebon Moss-Bachrach, his costar on The Bear. Ayo Edebiri, also of The Bear, will tread the boards this season, too, in a new revival of Proof with Don Cheadle. That show will be helmed by Tommy Kail, who is presently directing his wife, Michelle Williams, in Anna Christie at St. Ann’s Warehouse in Brooklyn.
Elsewhere this spring, Daniel Radcliffe will be back on Broadway in Every Brilliant Thing; Nathan Lane, Laurie Metcalf, and Christopher Abbott will lead a new revival of Death of a Salesman; John Lithgow will reprise his role as Roald Dahl in the Olivier–winning play Giant; Luke Evans will star in Rocky Horror Picture Show; Kelli O’Hara and Rose Byrne will partner up for Noël Coward’s Fallen Angels; and Taraji P. Henson and Cedric the Entertainer will lead August Wilson’s Joe Turner’s Come and Gone. Much to see and be inspired by—for audiences and performers alike.
“If you’re lucky you can still find yourself loving what you do and finding ways to grow and learn and collaborate and strive,” Brody told Crompton last year. “I’ll find ways to stay creative, and that is very comforting.”