in the first episode of Nathan Fielder's new show the rehearsal there's a comparison the
first guest core gives to Nathan that being the eccentric and zany chocolatier one William Wonka
which I think given its contextual placement is definitely fitting Fielder much like our
Candyman has chosen a specific person to help in his behind the scenes pulling all the strings in
order to make the rehearsal go as smoothly as possible they even play one of the songs
from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory but as much as I'd love to dive deep into comparison
of the Oompa Loompas to the child actors of the rehearsal I think there's actually
a better comparison for fielder in this series one a little more magical foreign
to prove to the world that Nathan Fielder Bears more similarities to The Wizard of Oz and tricking
people along the way into subscribing to me on the hit website youtube.com this is hizzy for you
before diving into the odds of it all I'd like to First preface about performative art which is
Loosely what the rehearsal is in most cases with performative art it's how the piece speaks to you
that's important so in doing this video it's my interpretation while watching the rehearsal what
I get out of it I only feel the need to make this clarification because last year I made a video on
how I viewed Bo Burnham's inside and got a decent amount of comments telling me how I was wrong and
I think the rehearsal is even more interpretable from what the meaning behind it is or how much
if any is meant to be real or strictly for show so while I find it interesting to see what other
people take from this series I don't really care if you think I'm wrong but enough of that
let's Follow the yellow brick road to get to the actual meat and potatoes of the video we all know
the Wizard of Oz Dorothy Toto the first person in history wanting to go back to Kansas and honestly
before writing this I hadn't re-watched The Wizard of Oz in over a decade and never realized the main
points of the plot are hinted at in the opening act of the film there's a lot of great aspects
to dive into on how this film simultaneously works as a fun Children's Fantasy and substance to take
away when you think deeper on it the spectacular presentation of the Technicolor from Becky sharp
the Whimsical music to match its visual vibrancy it's a classic you get it but we're not exploring
that I want to talk about the man behind the curtain in The Wizard of Oz they finally get
to the Great and Powerful Man known as Oz only to realize on their second visit that he's an
old man using tricks to appear more imposing once discovered by a detective Toto the great powerful
wizard quickly scrambles on rewards for our brave adventurers then he offers to go with Dorothy to
Kansas in his hot air balloon only for Toto to jump out leaving him flying off on his own due
to his incompetence and I get in a lot of ways this whole journey is meant to be interpreted
as a fictitious Adventure based on the beginning but I can't help but question Oz's whole shtick
it feels weird that he plays the majority of the major players that we see in the Emerald City from
the doorman to the guard to The Coachman a all this feels intentional for the background of Oz
if he's playing most of the parts then what's the point of being in charge stupid type of fella you
are you know what you uh you mind me the wizard of loneliness because you're your own self your
own wizard that's what you uh this is where the comparisons to the rehearsal start to percolate
in my mind there's the immediate similarity in that Nathan Offers these solutions for
people that likely already have the power to accomplish what they're asking for they just
need the encouragement to do so based on what we see from core and his friend he likely could
have easily told her this information on a good night of trivia now is that all because Nathan
invalidated the sanctity of trivia by getting the questions and slowly feeding him the answers so
it's days like these and I curse the Chinese for infecting granddaughter I think to me Cora had
the courage inside of him to conquer his fears but just needed the confidence and the push to
lead him in the right direction the same can be said about fake Angela or Thomas but specifically
fake Angela already likely has the ability to act as well as she shows I don't think the Fielder
method is specifically unlocking her abilities so this is again someone rewarded from the rehearsal
that already had what they needed inside of them then there's Nathan and Angela similar to the
events and Wizard of Oz we see Angela unable to continue this rehearsal unless she has someone
playing the father figure with her of course when Nathan steps in almost like Oz going with Dorothy
back to Kansas only for her to leave the blimp and much like Nathan be alone looking like a fool
on top of this Nathan plays a ton of different roles much like Oz that make me question to what
end if it's just for the sake of Comedy sure it's funny but there does feel like there's quite a bit
more going on in this show I think part of this lingering weirdness is intentional and asks us
to discuss the material because Nathan Fielder wants you to see and talk about the man behind
the curtain if the intention was just to be a weird comedy that would be one thing but there's
enough of the manipulation left in the edit to show you the Great Lengths he goes to in order
to keep the show running but by the end of this it's only a Nathan Fielder rehearsal which is
weird like he created the show in order to do some wacky and crazy scenes of possible outcomes that
will happen only to arrive with a man grappling with how he would commit to fatherhood in a
completely controlled environment which brings me back to the original question to what points are
the efforts of Oz and Nathan in their respective works in the case of Oz it feels like eccentric
fragility he allegedly has power over the Emerald City to do whatever he so pleases and he still
needs to perform trickery as part of his life all to keep you from uncovering the man behind
the curtain which I don't think is the same thing that's going on in the rehearsal in large part due
to the setting in the piece Fielder's rehearsal Wonderland is far more comedic than the utopic
Emerald City however despite this comedy being a central part the other key element the one that
feels more prevalent is fielders need to want to show you the man behind the curtain because he's
presumably given a lot of freedom on how this is viewed in the final edict there's a huge tonal
shift from episode one to two in terms of scope of the project possibly because a certain big
event you know the release of bloodshot 2020 but it shifts from following a man's trivia routine
to a through line with full surveillance of a test mother and what's interesting is despite
differing levels of control the outcomes end with Nathan inserting himself in each of these two
rehearsals with practicing telling core about the trivia cheating and him joining Angela in
the fake parenting exercise in both he's now included himself in the experiment I think an
argument could be made that it's more funny the more Nathan is included but I kind of disagree
with this because the show could do the fun Nathan High hijinks without him getting directly involved
I think this is meant as a means to show the illusion of power that Nathan has on this show
despite him being the main creative working on this creating those elaborate sets getting a whole
rotation of child actors getting the answers for trivia and all the other moving pieces
cord is one of the outcomes they didn't rehearse the Scion tC guy leaves the first day the gold
digger guy doesn't show up when they need to do the final rehearsal Angela decides to quit
the rehearsal before it's finished one of the child actors thinks of Nathan as more than just
a pretend dad all of the participants besides the actors of the rehearsal can't be controlled even
though the power is in the hands of those making the project any of these could have
been left out in chosen new subjects to try to get more successful outcomes but instead we're
left with these failures even with Nathan's own rehearsal which he has full control of
proved to be a failure depending on how you view the ending he doesn't confess to core he has to
restart his child's development because he's been gone too long he calls himself your dad
when he's pretending to be the mother of the heartbroken child whether the last one was in
actual flub or a calculated choice to me it doesn't affect what the show is saying the
message still coincides with everything else we see prior to that in that even with the
power to rehearse situations or weigh outcomes in your favor all of that gives you no control
for actual life there's so many decisions that we would all regret if we dwelled on
the numerous outcomes that could have happened and instead we're only left with the path we're
on currently nothing can rehearse you for the future so despite both Nathan and Oz playing
all the parts to make the show go on they still both end up like an emperor without his clothes
it's a crack
the crack
the quack quack