Critic Reviews

The Rehearsal gives Fielder the scope and breadth to fully explore his craziest ideas, and it truly seems as though Fielder has immensely grown as a storyteller and created one of the hands-down funniest shows of 2022. With Nathan For You, Nathan Fielder proved he was a brilliant comedic mind, but with The Rehearsal, Fielder proves he just might be a genius.

The Rehearsal is a masterpiece of awkward chaos that plays as both an extension and expansion of his heralded Comedy Central series Nathan for You. ... Fielder takes things so far that it’s difficult to imagine how he concocted this lunacy and impossible to stop laughing at the bravado of his peculiar showmanship.

There aren’t many shows, especially in the comedy world, taking the chances that The Rehearsal does. Nor are they lucky enough to be led by someone like Fielder, a comic visionary who has, once again, turned a parody of reality TV into a brilliant dissection of human nature.

The result is a defiantly unpredictable mix of cringe and pathos that delivers a distinct blend of genuine emotion and laugh-out-loud humor. In a streaming world that thrives on conformity, The Rehearsal is the audacious outlier that delivers a wholly unique viewing experience.

One that is more audacious and thoughtful, and at times funnier, than Nathan For You. ... The Rehearsal will create many feelings inside anyone watching it, starting with vast amusement and perhaps ranging all the way to tears, even at the fakest parts. This is a great one.

The result is something that can resemble a real-life Charlie Kaufman movie, or a less obviously malicious (but not un-scary) version of David Fincher's The Game. Sound weird? Trust me: Nathan's for you.

A brilliant, brain-breaking six-episode HBO series.

It is meant to disorient the viewer, and it works. ... Most important, it feels true. It is true enough that as the rehearsals play out, as more and more twists and M.C. Escher–esque turns are introduced into the rehearsal process, your body registers them as true and responds accordingly. You cannot help but want to cringe because it’s so byzantine and so simultaneously emotionally naked. Like it or not, that sensation of bodily distress is the feeling of Fielder’s rehearsals succeeding.

Season 2 is a gut-punch; an artful knock-out blow that further defies all classification, expectation, and logic.

“The Rehearsal” Season 2 [is] a cut above the vast majority of television, as well as a shrewd improvement on Season 1. And I said Season 1 was the best show of 2022, so…