by Robert Bouffard, Editor
The series finale of Nathan For You, “Finding Frances”, sees Nathan Fielder go to extreme lengths to help reunite Bill Heath with the woman he was in love with 50 years earlier, and with whom he has completely lost touch in the time since. Heath seems like a lonely man, full of regret over losing this woman so many decades before. Something drew Fielder to Heath’s plight, and watching Fielder’s latest project, The Rehearsal, it oddly comes across as if he saw something of himself in Heath, a man much, much older than himself. During their true crime-worthy investigation into where Frances might be now, Fielder sets up a small rehearsal for Heath, with an actress playing Frances, in which he can practice what he’ll do when he finally reunites with his long lost love. Looking forward, looking back, the desire to control it all, and the ultimate potential futility of that desire for control is what drives The Rehearsal, one of the best shows to air this year.
The Rehearsal is a lot of things, and it’s all but impossible to boil them all down in a single review. It would be a disservice to new viewers to give too much detail, because part of the joy and draw of the show is in watching the narrative unfold one episode at a time. But I do have to give some detail — just know I can’t do it justice in a couple paragraphs. The Rehearsal needs to be seen to be believed, and it needs to be digested, discussed, and absorbed.
In the first episode of his new show, Fielder devises a plan to help a man named Kor Skeete build up the courage to admit to his friend of over 10 years that he does not have a master’s degree, even though he’s led her and the rest of their trivia group to believe that he does. Fielder elaborately sets up the location where Skeete will be confessing his lie — a bar in New York City — and helps Skeete plan out every single thing he’ll say that evening (including hiring an actress to play his friend), accounting for any possible surprise. What Skeete doesn’t know is that Fielder recreated Skeete’s home before even meeting him, creating quite a web of rehearsals and layers of fiction. It’s nearly impossible to tell what’s real and what’s fake.
This opening episode is different from Nathan For You, but it carries with it much of the charm and humor that made the initial show so successful. The episode reels you in and provides a false sense of security — for how elaborate and convoluted it is, it’s still pretty straightforward, at least by Fielder’s standards. The storyline is easy to follow, even though you’ll be gasping and laughing at each reveal or story development. The layers it reveals are increasingly precipitous, and just as you’re settling in, thinking each week will be a new rehearsal for Fielder to organize, the rug is ripped out from underneath you in the second episode.
In the second episode, Fielder brings in Angela, a woman in her mid-40s, who wants to have the experience of having kids before actually committing to having kids. So Fielder sets her up in what amounts to a dream home in rural Oregon and brings in a rotation of young kids to simulate raising a child from a newborn to an 18-year-old. After unsuccessful attempts to find Angela a “husband” for the exercise, Fielder himself steps in, and that’s when the show becomes really fascinating.
I’ve spent the last few paragraphs trying to explain the setup of The Rehearsal, and if it still seems confusing, that’s because it is. It’s not straightforward in any sense of the word. It quickly becomes clear that Fielder isn’t necessarily interested in giving people a true opportunity to rehearse something important in their life. Instead, he’s more interested in exploring a few things at once: the allure of reality TV for both the viewers and subjects, the ways we encounter ourselves and others, regret, anxieties about the future, and forgiveness to name just a few. The Rehearsal is really unlike any other show I’ve ever seen, and that’s why it’s so difficult to describe and write about. That’s also why it’s must-watch TV.
This show blurs the lines between reality and fiction, much more than any “reality” show that’s come before it. In Fielder’s trademark deadpan delivery, we learn so much about the nature of humanity. It’s coming from such a unique angle that it’s difficult to look away. Five of the six episodes run for just about 30 minutes (the first episode is 44 minutes), but by the end, it feels like you’ve been watching for an hour thanks to all the emotions, ideas, and subtle trickery that Fielder layers into every frame of the show. It would be a totally valid response to any given episode to just sit and stare at your television in awe and disbelief once it’s over, wondering if what you’ve just seen is even allowed. And unlike Nathan For You, Fielder actually takes the time to examine whether what he’s doing has any ethical merit. The answer is murky, and even if you think it goes too far at points, you won’t be able to help wanting more.
As he dives further and further down the layers of fiction, actors, and rehearsals, and as the whole thing becomes more and more confounding for the audience, Fielder recons with whether he’s exploiting his subjects, laughing at them, laughing with them, or just laughing at the situations they’re being put in. Sometimes it’s just one of those options, sometimes it’s more than one, and sometimes it’s all of them. It’s all part of the ambiguous voyeurism inherent in watching this show. He’s commenting on the practice of creating and watching reality TV, with a compassion for his subjects that, is surprising for the medium. At times, it seems like the compassion only appeared for Fielder late in the process of shooting, and especially in the editing room, but that tension drives the show.
What ultimately makes The Rehearsal so unbelievably special is that Fielder is understanding himself through the process of making the show, and by extension, we can begin to understand him, others, and ourselves. That same regret from “Finding Frances” permeates every second of The Rehearsal, and each action seems to be an attempt at counteracting the effects of that regret, by trying to control every little detail. The results are perhaps inconclusive, but they’re intriguing nonetheless. The show’s message (or messages) isn’t right on the surface, but it’s there for the taking. There are layers to everything and everyone. Give this show a chance, and in doing so, you might just learn how to give yourself and other people a chance as well.
Score: 10/10
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