That can generate mortification, though what really concerned people was the role children played in Fielder’s staged antics, which oddly didn’t make people examine the way all child actors are used in any entertainment, which it probably should have. As with Nathan for You, Fielder mixes actual service, slightly mocking exposure and full-on self-laceration, though usually with some compassion for the human condition. In The Rehearsal, the joke is about post-COVID alienation and the illusion of control, with Fielder’s own trademark nebbishy neurosis at the center. What is the joke and why is it uncomfortable? In Jury Duty, you think the hero is Ronald Gladden, an innocent juror who retains a healthy sense of decency while a group of comedians stage increasingly heightened antics in the hope of making him break, except that the hero is actually James Marsden, rather hilariously playing self-important Sonic the Hedgehog star James Marsden. Goldman Courtesy of Evans Vestal Ward/Peacock Goldman - whose Emmy submission as a documentary series was rejected, forcing it to resubmit in the limited-series category - you think the hero is the brokenhearted, dweeby Goldman (real name Paul Finkelman), who was betrayed by a grifting woman and uncovered a sex trafficking ring, except that the hero is actually director Jason Woliner, who uses a six-episode television series to expose an unsuspecting Goldman’s delusions and underlying misogyny. In The Rehearsal, you think the heroes are the regular folks who enlist Nathan Fielder to stage elaborate re-creations - or “pre-creations,” really - of life events as a means of battling social anxiety, except that Fielder is actually the hero, as he delves deeper and deeper into his own insecurities and his own displacement in a world of his own making. Goldman and Jury Duty present a very different and far more complicated dilemma: Are they ethical? Are they exploitative? If they’re funny, why are they funny? If they’re provocative, what do they provoke? There’s a built-in friction that comes from watching these shows, which could be either part of the pleasure or part of the polarizing disconnect one person’s brilliant subversion of conventions could be another person’s reinforcement of traditional power structures.Īgain, it comes down to questions, even if the answers are subjective. Goldman and Freevee’s Jury Dutypresent a very specific challenge: What are they? Reality? Comedy? Limited? Variety? But for viewers, shows like The Rehearsal, Paul T. On the other hand, bringing back The Joe Schmo Show became an oddly obvious choice after a year in which the lines between scripted comedy and reality became more blurry than ever before, or at least more blurry than any point since that mid-’00s moment when The Joe Schmo Show and Joe Millionaire and even forgotten oddities like FX’s Todd TV - this TV critic remembers Todd TV so you don’t have to - proliferated.įor Emmy voters, shows like HBO’s The Rehearsal, Peacock’s Paul T. Tony Awards: Wendell Pierce, Jessica Chastain Among Snubs as Lone Winners for 'Shucked,' 'Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window' Surprise
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