History Series / TheRehearsal

* PetTheDog: Despite her shaky relationship with Nathan, Angela acts very respectfully and even kindly when [[spoiler: deciding to quit the show]], even thanking him for giving her this opportunity.

** A rare Jewish fundamentalist appears in the form of Miriam, who uses her religion to defend any action of Israel, including attacks on Palestinian citizens. Rather than end with a song as usual, the credits for Episode 5 play over an extended rant by Miriam in which she extols Israel's alleged superiority to other nations, including the claims that they're single-handedly responsible for modern medicine and technology.

** Miriam believes that all modern medical and computer technology comes directly from Israel, and that the existence of the nation of Israel is the only thing keeping the modern western world afloat.

* Patrick had a falling out with his brother following the death of their grandfather because Patrick's brother won't allow him to have his portion of the inheritance on the grounds that all of Patrick's girlfriends are "gold diggers." As a result, the two brothers have been at odds for some time, and Patrick hasn't been able to grieve his grandfather's death because the focus has solely been on the will. [[spoiler: After Patrick disappears and seemingly no longer needs to participate in the rehearsal, Nathan speculates that grieving the "death" of the actor playing his friend helped him work through his issues.]]

** Subverted with Kor, who tells Nathan he has to confess a dark secret to his friend, Tricia. It turns out the "secret" is that he impulsively lied about having a masters' degree during a trivia game ten years ago, when in fact he only has a bachelor's degree. When he finally admits it, [[spoiler: Tricia friend doesn't care]].

** The series is ostensibly an episodic show about Nathan Fielder helping a new person each week prepare for different situations; in Episode 2, he [[spoiler: immediately decides to become part of his own experiment when Angela is unable to find a suitable partner for her rehearsal, and the show takes on a serial format following the pair living together in a rental home and roleplaying as parents to a series of child actors for six weeks.]]

* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: Robbin quickly bails on coparenting during the first night because the robot baby’s crying isn’t letting him sleep.

''The Rehearsal'' is a docu-reality comedy television series created by and starring Canadian comedian Creator/NathanFielder. In each episode, Nathan offers to help someone with their personal issues by allowing them to rehearse for their lives. He is well-meaning but extremely awkward, leading to many CringeComedy moments.

The show is a CreatorDrivenSuccessor to Fielder’s previous series ''Series/NathanForYou'', another CringeComedy docuseries in which he tries to help people through unconventional methods.

* ParentalAbandonment: Within the rehearsal in episode 4, Nathan had abandoned Adam for nine years.

--->'''Nathan:''' "Next thing you know, I'll bring home some oranges and that will be Satanic!"

* SoapOperaRapidAgingSyndrome: Adam ages extremely rapidly during the rehearsal due to constantly being replaced with new actors to represent growing up. When Nathan leaves for his acting class and returns, he had grown from 6 to 15.

** Angela grew up in an abusive household and turned to drugs and alcohol as a teenager, which explains why she turned to religious fundamentalism later in her life.

* TheMirrorShowsYourTrueSelf: [[Subverted]], comically so, with the mirrors in Angela's house. In order to enhance the illusion of time passing rapidly, Nathan has special mirrors installed that digitally alter his appearance to make him appear the age he "should" be if three years were passing for every lived week.

* ContinuityNod: The bar Nathan has built in the pilot keeps popping back up in the series in increasingly strange ways. Nathan first has the entire set flown across country and reassembled next to his office so he can hang out there; later, he actually opens it as a full-service bar and hires his students to work there, building a tunnel leading from the street into the building to lure in unsuspecting passerby.

* AntiHero: Nathan constantly manipulates everyone around him, albeit usually for a good cause.

* MotorMouth: In the first episode, Kor's friend Tricia is constantly talking, usually complaining about her day. When she was supposed to be interviewing a birdwatcher, she spends most of the time talking, giving the person being interviewed little time to talk herself. Fake Tricia mimicked this trait when acting as her.

* NumerologicalMotif: Robbin is obsessed with numerology to the extent he tries to find deeper, cosmic significance to every number he encounters, from license plates to addresses.

* HolierThanThou: Robbin hates his roommate for not believing in Jesus. UpToEleven after Robbin himself flat out celebrated his former roommate's death on social media. He later claimed that Nathan (who is Jewish) wanted to kill him for being Christian.
* LeftHanging: Patrick's storyline involving his grandfather's will and relationship with his brother. [[spoiler: While Patrick has a pretty emotional breakthrough after the "death" of the actor playing his new friend, he doesn't show up the following day and claims that he went to go try funnel cake with his girlfriend instead and invites Nathan to join him at an amusement park. Once Nathan arrives, he gets stood up by Patrick and never sees him again.
* {{Manchild}}: Angela is rather immature and childlike and is constantly playing around during her free time. Nathan even questions whether she really wants to prepare for motherhood or if she's just using the show as an opportunity to get a free vacation.

* MindScrew: The rehearsals become ever more confusing as the show continues, taking on a rehearsals-within-rehearsals nesting doll structure. For example, episode 4 finds Nathan teaching an acting class and growing uncertain how effective his methods are for one particular student. So Nathan hires actors to play his class and takes on the role of the student in question, with an actor playing Nathan teaching the same lessons he teaches his class. Meanwhile, Nathan instructs his student to get a job at a juice bar to understand a role he's playing; within the confines of the classroom rehearsal, Nathan- playing the student- himself gets a job in a juice bar to understand his student's experience. Nathan then manipulates the student into moving into a new apartment so that he can move in himself to better understand his life; but, because Nathan made the student move, Nathan- in his role as the student- is himself then forced to move to the same new apartment, containing actors playing actors playing roommates.

* MindScrew: The rehearsals become ever more confusing as the show continues, taking on a rehearsals-within-rehearsals nesting doll structure. For example, episode 4 finds Nathan teaching an acting class and growing uncertain how effective his methods are for one particular student. So Nathan hires actors to play his class and takes on the role of the student in question, with an actor playing Nathan teaching the same lessons he teaches his class. Meanwhile, Nathan instructs his student to get a job at a juice bar to understand a role he's playing; within the confines of the classroom rehearsal, Nathan- playing the student- himself gets a job in a juice bar to understand his student's experience. Nathan then manipulates the student into moving into a new apartment so that he can move in himself to better understand his life; but, because Nathan made the student move, Nathan- in his role as the student- is himself then forced to move to the same new apartment.

** The series is ostensibly an episodic show about Nathan Fielder helping a new person each week prepare for different situations; in Episode 2, he [[spoiler: immediately decides to become part of his own experiment when Angela is unable to find a suitable partner for her rehearsal, and the show takes on a serial format following the pair living together in a rental home and roleplaying as parents to a series of child actors for six weeks.

* LeftHanging: Patrick's storyline involving his grandfather's will and relationship with his brother. While Patrick has a pretty emotional breakthrough at his rehearsal, he doesn't show up the following day and claims that he went to go try funnel cake with his girlfriend instead and invites Nathan to join him at an amusement park. Once Nathan arrives, he gets stood up by Patrick and never sees him again.

* MindScrew: The rehearsals become ever more confusing as the show continues, taking on a rehearsals-within-rehearsals nesting doll structure. For example, episode 4 finds Nathan teaching an acting class and growing uncertain how effective his methods are for one particular student; so Nathan hires actors to play his class and takes on the role of the student in question, with an actor playing Nathan teaching the same lessons he teaches his class. Meanwhile, Nathan instructs his student to get a job at a juice bar to understand a role he's playing; within the confines of the classroom rehearsal, Nathan- playing the student- himself gets a job in a juice bar to understand his student's experience.

* NotSoAboveItAll: Miriam initially seems like a voice of reason to Angela, pointing out her Antisemitism and convincing Nathan to stand up for himself. That is at least until the end of the episode, when she starts defending Israeli attacks against Palestinian civilians, and we see that she isn't much different than Angela.
* NumerologicalMotif: Robbin is obsessed with numerology and tries to find deeper meanings within numbers in any given situation.

* PetTheDog: Despite her shaky relationship with Nathan, Angela acted very respectfully and even kindly when [[spoiler: leaving the rehearsals]], even thanking him for giving her this opportunity.

* PsychologicalHorror: The weirdness and surreal nature of Nathan's rehearsals cause the show to possibly veer into horror territory.

** In Episode 5, Fake Angela delivers a brutal takedown of Nathan in a rehearsal. Notably, unlike Fake Kor's takedown, Fielder appears to break character and ask if they can replay the scene with a more positive outcome.

* SanityBall: In any given situation, the sanity ball can be passed between Nathan and the subjects of each episode. While Nathan may weird out people through his awkwardness and lack of social skills, he often later reacts with shock to the same people's bizarre statements.

** In episode 5, she gets angry at Nathan for playing a game with Adam where he pretended to eat poop, as she claimed that eating poop is a Satanic ritual. Nathan angrily claims that she is convinced everything is Satanic.
--->'''Nathan:''' "Next thing you know, I'll bring home some oranges and that will be satanic!"

* SoUnfunnyItsFunny: Nathan's attemtps at making jokes usually fall flat, but this awkwardness just makes them funny. For instance, his infamous line "Door city over here."

* TheStoner: Robbin is constantly high, even while driving. He later admitted to Vice that the car crash he keeps referencing in the show occured because he was high.

** Most of the people in the show are rather strange, but Robbin stands out. He has an extreme obsession with numerology and makes random connections with every number he sees, randomly brings up crashing his Scion all the time, hates his roommate for not believing in Jesus, drives while high, tries to solicit sex from an unmarried woman who explicitly said that they're waiting for marriage, and doesn’t have a license plate. He lacks any self awareness and thinks all of these things are normal. This trope became more enforced when his relatives on social media confirmed that his actions weren't unscripted and he's actually that cracked in real life.
*** Robbin didn't do himself any favors going to Vice to "clear the air" for an interview that just made him seem more unhinged than he did on the show. Among other admissions, he clarifies that he crashed the aforementioned Scion during an illegal street race while high and drunk, and complains that the producers cut out all the parts of his appearance in which he compared himself to Jesus. He also claims he believed Nathan Fielder wanted to murder him for being Christian.

** Angela grew up in an abusive household and turned to drugs and alcohol in her teenage years, which explains why she turned to fundamental religion later in her life.

** Robbin spends much of his screentime casually talking about his troubled past, including how he survived wrecking a Scion driving 100mph.
* {{Deuteragonist}}: Angela is treated as the second main character of the first season, playing a major role in most of the episodes in the season, other than the first and last episodes.
* {{Dramedy}}: While primarily a comedy, it often treats the struggles throughout the episode seriously and can be surprisingly heartfelt.

* HalfwayPlotSwitch: The first three episodes revolve primarily around Nathan helping a new person every episode rehearse for something in their lives that they've been putting off. [[spoiler: However, shortly after inserting himself into Angela's family rehearsal, Nathan becomes fixated on the rehearsal of his own life. The final three episodes are focused almost entirely on Nathan's rehearsal home life and the production of the show itself.]]

* MindScrew: The rehearsals become even more confusing as the show continues, even appearing in multiple layers of rehearsals. For instance, Nathan interacts with an actor playing himself while playing someone else and relives the acting class he taught multiple times.
* MirrorCharacter: Angela and Miriam are more similar than they first appear. While initially presented as a voice of reason to Angela's fundamentalism and anti-Semetism, Miriam eventually reveals her prejudice against Palestinians by defending Israel's attacks and all of its actions. While Angela and Miriam dislike one another for their religious views, their views are surprisingly similar in the end.

The show is a [[invoked]]SpiritualSuccessor to Fielder’s previous series ''Series/NathanForYou'', another CringeComedy docuseries in which he tries to help people through unconventional methods.

* TheFundamentalist: Several pop up

* UnsympatheticComedyProtagonist: While ultimately well meaning, Nathan does questionable things and manipulates others, much to comedic effect. As the series goes on, his actions take on darker undertones, including convincing a man his friend has died, faking a teenager ODing, and taking a child to religious services against his mother's wishes and without her knowledge.