Review of "Rehearsal," an ambitious meta-comedy that will give you a headache
Genius comedian Nathan Fielder is back with a new project in which he helps people rehearse life's most important moments.
If the name Nathan Fielder doesn't ring a bell, you've probably missed the great and five-minute cult series "Nathan Helping Out," in which the comedian poses as a business consultant. He travels around America and suggests unusual strategies for entrepreneurs to increase their income - for example, making an antique store a 24-hour store and enticing drunkards from the bar across the street to accidentally break something and be forced to pay. Such unconventional and ambiguous ideas abounded - the business owners did not always believe in success, but they agreed to try. After all, they had already signed up to participate in a show that could really be confused with a show about magical transformation. The domestic equivalent is "At knives" with Konstantin Ivlev, but only if the chef offered to add fecal-flavored yogurt to the coffeehouse menu (Nathan succeeded!).
It is true that "Nathan Hurry to Help" rather quickly moved away from the stereotypical format and turned into a kind of observation diary, where the socially awkward Fielder (it is unclear where the line between the image and the real person lies) learned to communicate with people and thereby impose his friendship on entrepreneurs. It was as if the purpose of the show had been transformed - not to help with business, but to try to win favor. In addition, a noticeable role was played by the comedian's penchant for deconstruction, his desire to twist an idea to the point of absurdity and go methinks. In one of the episodes, Fielder hid an unsociable man in a secret place for several weeks, and he disguised himself, lived his life: he met a girl and dared to walk on a tightrope between two buildings in order to impress the audience. When the stunt was over, the comedian stealthily retreated into the shadows, and to his new date and the crowd of gawkers released the very same man - he got the fame and the kiss. Fielder, meanwhile, stared dead-eyed at the triumph that was his due.
In four seasons, certain cases of the Nathan's Helping Hand project have made national noise: a specially created viral video for a zoo in which a pig saves a goose became a sensation. Stupid Starbucks, a coffee shop that circumvents the parody law, was constantly in the news. And a book written by a professional guestwriter about a man who allegedly got in shape by helping movers carry things became an Amazon bestseller. The main legacy of the series, though, will not be the mockery of the struggling entrepreneurs or one of the scandals, but a reflection on complex human nature. Sometimes it forces you to follow another's lead, and sometimes it forces you to find a reflection of your own fears and traumas in someone else's story.
From a mixture of documentary and observations on human behavior grew "Rehearsal," the strangest and most inexplicable series of recent years. Here Fielder is again the host, but the characters are ordinary people who would like to rehearse an important upcoming episode. For example, the first episode asks for help from a middle-aged man who lied to his friends more than 10 years ago about getting a master's degree and now would like to reveal the truth. At least to one friend, the most evil and unpredictable. The hero is offered a simple in word but wild in deed: the show's creators will build a realistic setting where the conversation is to take place, and an actress who has fraudulently met that very friend will play her. Based on the rehearsals will make a perfect plan of events, which is sure to end with success.
True, the unusual concept is only a shell of "Rehearsal." The series is far more complex, cringe-worthy and absurd than the idea of helping people rehearse particular moments in life. Fielder reappears here as an awkward and often misunderstood communication mechanism - a confession with which the series begins. He takes advantage of the show's services himself - deceptively recreating the first contestant's apartment to prepare the jokes and make a perfect meeting with him. He also makes the characters experience the same moral dilemma that their interlocutors will face during an important conversation. The same bachelor without a master's degree will have a choice whether or not to forgive Fielder, who "cheated" him during rehearsals.
The longer this six-episode project goes on, the harder it becomes to distinguish reality from the creator's sick fantasy. I don't want to reveal the later details of the show, but just know that the only way to compare it to the movie "New York, New York. In Charlie Kaufman's picture, the depressing playwright recreated the city in a pavilion and ran actors playing real people there. Fielder, for his part, becomes the main participant in "Rehearsal" - surrounding himself with actors, teaching people how to live other people's lives, trying to become a different person to look at himself from the outside, and replaying individual moments dozens of times. At some point you start to lose the logic of what is going on and grab your head, but you can't tear yourself away from the screen anyway - the way Fielder embodies the wildest and most ridiculous ideas is impossible to watch without admiration.
However, "The Rehearsal," like "Nathan Hurries to the Rescue," does not give the impression of a soulless, formalistic experiment. On the contrary, after watching the show, it is a down-to-earth, humanistic, and in many ways even naive story that celebrates the unpredictability of life. Of course, it is possible to calculate any outcomes of the conversation, to recreate reality around it and populate it with doppelgangers, but this will never replace the improvised and random moments that cannot be foreseen. The only thing that will remain in memory is a casually thrown but so sincere "I love you," rather than dozens of attempts to repeat the phrase, which turns into an insensitive retort from the actor.
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