The Rehearsal (Seasons 1–2)

The Rehearsal (2022) is Nathan Fielder's HBO docucomedy series — watch it online on iFILM. The premise: Fielder builds exact-replica sets, recruits casts of stand-ins, and runs an ordinary person through unlimited dress rehearsals of a single difficult conversation until chance is effectively removed from the equation.

The six-episode first season opens with something almost mundane — a man needs to come clean about a small lie to his trivia partner — and quietly escalates into Fielder himself rehearsing parenthood across several months, with a rotating cast of child actors playing the same toddler. The logistics become absurd. The emotional stakes become oddly real.

Fielder's previous show Nathan for You established the template of cringe-comedy with a strange undertow of sincerity; The Rehearsal expands that to feature-length chapters and a much stranger central question about whether rehearsal makes life better or just delays it. It's the least comfortably categorized show of the year it aired, which is exactly its strength. Stream The Rehearsal online on iFILM.