Russell Tovey tour-de-force in nerve-shredding drama

The Donmar Warehouse

⭑⭑⭑⭑

It’s an on-the-edge-of-your-seat thriller. It’s a pull-the-rug-from-under-your-feet whodunit. Most of all, The Guilty is a grab-you-by-the-throat triumph for Russell Tovey.

It’s already a tense atmosphere in the Donmar because nobody is more than four rows away from the stage. Whatever is going to happen, it will right in our faces and in real time. And we know the director Felix Barrett is a master at shock and suspense- he directed Paranormal Activity as well as many a spooky immersive production from Punchdrunk.

There’s one claustrophobic set. And one actor. Joe, played by Russell Tovey, sits at a desk in the middle of the night taking police emergency calls. The rest of the room is in semi-gloom with two desks at the back shrouded in dust sheets. An overhead fluorescent tube flickers, pin prick red lights flash to flag emergencies. Frankly, I was so riveted by Tovey, I hardly noticed the rest of Alex Eales’ set, but I can say it was pretty gray and decidedly spooky

Joe appears to be on this light duty, and I use the word ‘light’ advisedly, away from both his colleagues and what he might regard as real police work because he has been accused of doing something wrong. He faces a hearing the next day and is clearly upset. But is he guilty? If so, of what? We wait to find out while he takes annoyingly trivial calls.

If he’s had any training in customer service, it’s clearly forgotten or subsumed by his current problems. For example, he receives a complaint about music from a neighbour: ‘Get some f—-ing ear plugs’, he responds angrily. He’s a man on the brink but will something tip him over? We’re already feeling stressed.

We hear the people at the other end of the phone- the callers, the colleagues he needs to investigate reports, his colleague who is giving evidence in his favour, his estranged daughter and wife. Then he gets a call that sets a crisis in motion. A woman, speaking quietly and in code, tells him she has been abducted in a van. Not only that, her young children are left alone at home. Joe instigates a chase, while undertaking an unofficial remote investigation of where she is and who has taken her.

He seems to have a desperate need to be a hero, the powerful man who will save the day .

He obtains a telephone number and is able to talk to the woman’s daughter. Like us, he constructs a story of who is guilty, and of what, around what he is hearing and what may be missing from the conversations. It feels like this opportunity is just what he needed, to help him feel good about himself.

Thanks to Russell Tovey’s extraordinarily committed performance, we feel his frustration, his anger, his panic. We are carried along with him, passengers on an unstoppable rollercoaster that is leading to a potentially tragic conclusion.

There’s no time to consider whether some of Chloë Moss‘s script may not add up (would he really be on his own, or even doing this kind of work?). You’re right in the thick of it and the stress is unbearable. Your fingers are clamped to your seat, you can feel your perspiration. When the climax arrives after quite a few twists, you are wrung out.

Only for there to be one more revelation, of a more theatrical nature, which may or may not suggest this was all in his head- a dream or a fantasy in which he hoped to redeem some of the guilt he feels. But that’s only one of many possible interpretations of this taut thriller. What is indisputable is that Russell Tovey gives a tour-de-force in a drama that could only take place in a theatre.

The Guilty can be seen at The Donmar Warehouse until 15 August 2026. Buy tickets directly from the theatre www.donmarwarehouse.com

Paul paid for his ticket.

Watch this review on the YouTube channel Theatre Reviews With Paul Seven