English Podcast

The podcast episode discusses the TV show "The Rehearsal" on HBO Max. The host and guests discuss the use of fourth wall breaks and the show's commentary on authenticity in media. They mention specific scenes that ground the audience back into reality and highlight the show's over-engineered situations. The host and guests agree that the show is trying to make the audience more aware of what is real and what is not in the media they consume. They also mention a larger trend of directors becoming more meta in their work. The episode concludes with a discussion about the importance of authenticity in media. Welcome back to The Couch Potato, a podcast where we report on, analyze, and recommend the best TV so that you never have to take a break from binge watching. I'm your host, Sally Thompson, and today I'm joined by two avid binge watchers, here to discuss the new binge-worthy series on HBO Max, The Rehearsal. Hi, I'm Anika, and I'm really excited to be joined by you today. Same here, I'm Niamh. Yeah, I'm really excited to have y'all with me today because today we're going to be talking about the various fourth wall breaks that Nathan Fielder uses throughout the show and how I think he's using these scenes to make a statement about authenticity in modern media. I'm excited. Are you guys? Yeah! Absolutely. So for our viewers that haven't watched The Rehearsal, it's basically a show where a comedian named Nathan Fielder simulates situations that give people an opportunity to rehearse and experience scenarios that they may eventually experience in real life. What did you guys think of the show? Well, I think it was one of the best shows I've seen this year. Like, it was such an interesting show and one thing that I really noticed that made it interesting was the demonstrations of the setups of the rehearsals itself. Yeah, I thought that was really interesting too because it kept kind of reminding me of how staged and unreal the environment is. I agree, Anika. And like you said, the sets, they have a very important role in the environment of the show. But what I did find interesting was that how they move your attention away from what is happening whenever the rehearsal wants you to go back to the situation that is occurring at the real moment. And this grounds you back in reality. I thought it was a little jarring, but it was a unique part of the show nonetheless. I understand that. I've never seen a show be so aware of its own premise, but I do think that it made the show's commentary on authenticity in media more impactful. So, a specific example of how the rehearsal shows these sets that ground you back into reality is them switching the child actors through the window. In the final rehearsal that they do when Nathan Fielder wants to try being a father, he uses these child actors so that they can help him really immerse himself within the parental experience. And when they age those child actors by three years to simulate this reality, it feels like it's not a natural transition. And that was one particular instance of how the show grounds you back into reality that these people are actually acting and not real parents or real children of parents. Yeah, I kind of noticed what you're talking about in the scene in the Raising Canes where Nathan's doing the rehearsal with Patrick. And we have this kind of beautiful emotional moment where Patrick actually breaks down and starts crying, which I think is one of the only times in the show that we've seen Nathan's rehearsal seem to actually allow someone to unlock something within themselves. And so we have this beautiful moment and then the camera cuts to the woman pretending to eat the chicken tenders. And it just felt like the producers chose to show us that because they wanted to break up that emotional tension that had been created. They wanted to ground us back in the reality of the rehearsal and of the over-engineered situation. They didn't want us to get too invested in the emotional situation. So I was reading this article from the New York Times called All the World is Staged. And the author says, repeatedly, Fielder pulls a rug out from under you and underneath it there's another rug held by another Fielder. Who pulls that one out too? It feels like he was describing me because when I was watching personally, everything was a little fast paced and sometimes confusing at times, but entertaining nonetheless. And a lot of the rehearsal has many dramatic moments that you have to try to get through to truly appreciate. Yeah, I think that grows a great visualization of how Mason is perpetually so invested in these rehearsals and these illusions. And the clip you mentioned with the baby being switched out of the window and the clip I mentioned about the chicken tenders, they're a way for him to show the audience that he's the puppet master. And he's showing us these clips to almost ensure that the audience doesn't get caught in the simulation with the participants in the show. For whatever reason, it's important to him that the audience is periodically in the minds of all of these situations. Yeah, yeah. And I think in that same breath, Nathan's also trying, like throughout the show, he was trying to keep up this fake universe for his audience. Like, for example, in episode three, there was a scene where he showed his staff literally planting vegetables, like fully grown vegetables in his garden, like sticking zucchinis into the dirt, which is really funny. But I think it kind of shows how Nathan was feeling really rushed to keep Angela's rehearsal as perfectly simulated as possible. But one thing that stuck out that he showed in episode three was there was a sticker on one of the bell peppers that showed that they bought this from the grocery store. So that kind of shows that, like, you can't manipulate growing vegetables. You can't manipulate a garden. It's very hard to perfectly encapsulate reality. And I think he purposefully showed these scenes to show how hard it is to replicate real life through the teeth. And that actually reminded me of a very profound quote that Nathan said in episode six when he went to Remy's real home. It was strange being in a real child's home after being in a fake one for so long. I wasn't used to this level of detail. Every object was perfectly placed, but nothing was by design. It was a work of art, and it was just real life. So this quote is very important because I think it is one of the overarching themes of The Red Herd Assault. Nathan Fielder, he oftenly over-engineers situations that are intended to replicate real human experiences. So for him, an object has to be in the exact same place as it was before. And when he tries doing this for the children that he's trying to mimic, it's not completely authentic. It's one of the main messages you can get out of the rehearsal, which is that no matter how hard you try to replicate something, it cannot truly match the authenticity of its originality. Yeah, I definitely think he's trying to highlight the fact that despite all of the effort and money that he puts into creating and maintaining these illusions, at the end of the day, he's still unable to recreate the authentic feeling of real life. And he wants us to see that. He wants the viewer to take that away from the show. And I think he makes the situations feel inauthentic to the viewer on purpose. And I think this might be a criticism of all the inauthenticities that we see in media. And I think he's arguing that we need more authenticity in media. We need to be aware of what's real and what isn't real in the media that we consume. And in the rehearsal, I think these scenes where he shows the set-up and the illusions is his way of making the audience hyper-aware of the show's premise and the over-engineered situations. Well, after our discussion, I'm beginning to think it's not so bad that he included these factors that help you ground back in reality, because they have their own element and purpose as well. Yeah, and that's an element that I particularly liked in the show. And I think it's an element that I've been seeing more and more in media. And I really think that this show is part of a bigger revolution. Directors have been starting to become very meta about their work. And I think that's a very exciting development. Like, for example, there's a new Barbie movie coming out on July 21st. And I recently saw an interview about it that showed how they're similar to how children play with their Barbies. The actors in Barbie land, there will be no water. And so when they shower, they're going to be fake showering, and they're going to be fake brushing their teeth. So these are literally things that kids do with their Barbies. And I like how they're going to show that same exact scenario in the movie. Yeah, I'm excited about this new wave of media where we're seeing more authenticity. And I think in terms of the rehearsal, he's showing authenticity through showing an almost satirical level of inauthenticity, you know? Kind of the contrast between reality and the fake parts of the show. Yeah. Well, couch potatoes, that's all the time we have for today. Big thanks to Amika and Nannan for joining me on the show today. We will catch you next time for another deep dive into one of your favorite shows. Stay on the couch.