The Rehearsal Calls Out Paramount+ For Cowardly Removing A Daring Nathan For You Episode

Although "The Rehearsal" season 2 is largely about Nathan Fielder's valiant quest to solve passenger airplane crashes once and for all, its second episode detours into solving another issue: In 2023, the streaming service Paramount+ removed a season 3 episode of Fielder's hit show "Nathan For You." Fielder struggled to effectively raise his concerns with Paramount+ at the time because, as he notes in this latest episode, he didn't want to mess up his chances of getting "The Curse" renewed. ("The Curse," another Fielder-led TV show, also streams on Paramount+.)

The removed "Nathan For You" episode was "Horseback Riding/Man Zone." It features a storyline where Fielder is dismayed to find out that Taiga, the company that owned his favorite jacket, had published a tribute in 2001 to "notorious Holocaust denier Doug Collins in their winter catalog." As a Jew himself, Fielder could not abide this. He stopped wearing Taiga apparel and created his own apparel company called Summit Ice, which would heavily prioritize Holocaust awareness in its marketing. Meaning well, Fielder designed a Summit Ice marketing campaign that looks less educational and more like a celebration (or commodification) of the Third Reich. 

Although the butt of the joke here was Fielder himself, it's easy to see how the "Nathan For You" segment could be misinterpreted as making light of the Holocaust. Fielder is made a fool in his attempt to educate shoppers about the subject, and the Rabbi he consults for the project comes across as a dope. What makes the joke clear, however, is the reaction of the store owner Fielder tries to sell the idea to. The guy, who appears to be a real person (it's tough to tell on Fielder's shows), is on board with Fielder's mission until he sees what it actually looks like.

The joke also comes with the underlying implication that Fielder's less interested in Holocaust awareness than he is with making a profit. Fielder continued the bit in a later interview on "Conan" in which Fielder switched up his tone quickly the moment host Conan O'Brien asked if his business was relying on child labor:

In "Star Potential," Fielder explains what's happened to that episode in the years since. Fielder discovered in late 2023 that the Summit Ice episode "mysteriously disappeared" from the Paramount+ service. When he asked the company what happened, they explained that, in the wake of the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel, "Paramount+ Germany [decided] to remove the episode in their region after they became uncomfortable with what they called 'anything that touches on antisemitism.'"

In his typical deadpan voice, Fielder explains how the German branch's decision spread throughout Europe. As he talks, he shows a map of German Paramount+'s expansion that evokes the Germany military's expansion during WWII. Fielder continues, "Before long, the ideology of Paramount+ Germany had spread throughout the entire globe, eliminating all Jewish content that made them uncomfortable. This is real, by the way."

Sure enough, the "Nathan For You" episode was indeed removed from the Paramount+ everywhere, and that remains the case as of the writing this article. Not only has it been removed, but the decision received remarkably little news coverage when it happened in 2023. When streaming services were removing episodes with Blackface in them throughout 2020, those decisions constantly made headlines, but the removal of "Horseback Riding/Man Zone" received no such treatment. There's a good chance that "Star Potential" is the first time a lot of long-time "Nathan for You" fans had even heard of this. 

Throughout "Star Potential," Fielder continues the joke from the "Nathan For You" episode by making clear he still doesn't understand why anyone would have a problem with what he did there. "It's been my proudest achievement," he says, "and served as my only proof to these pilots that a comedy show can actually make a difference." He describes the company as having "raised millions of dollars for Holocaust awareness," and there's technically a possibility that might actually be true: Summit Ice is a real clothing brand Fielder created. The site is currently down, but for years fans were able to buy the clothing.

Paramount+ didn't see the appeal of the "Nathan For You" episode. In the episode of "The Rehearsal," Fielder notes that he could've fought back harder when he first found it'd been removed, and decides to rehearse a meeting where he could confront the Paramount+ Germany branch and convince them to bring the episode back. He does this "rehearsal" by portraying the people running the branch as literal Nazis, with Paramount+ banners hanging ominously from their office windows. 

"You guys probably feel a lot of shame about what you did in the past, so now you're trying to overcompensate by being the world leaders in fighting antisemitism," Nathan says in the rehearsal, "But when it comes to art, I think you have to know your place, and you have to let us Jews express ourselves."

Of course, the always-reflective Fielder doesn't let this scene be a straight-forward moment of ripping into Paramount+. He asks the actor playing the German Paramount+ manager to improvise and challenge him, and that's exactly what he does. "You designed this office to look a war room," the actor tells him. "You dressed me to look like a Nazi. Pretending to want feedback, but you don't actually want to get the Paramount+ perspective or the German perspective. [...] This is not sincere. You're just a man with a grudge using his television show to smear us, instead of trying to understand us." 

So for viewers who are vehemently opposed to streamers who remove TV episodes due to evolving sensitivities, this week's "The Rehearsal" offers you about twenty seconds of catharsis as Fielder calls them out. It follows this up with another twenty seconds of self-reflection, as Fielder's character realizes that perhaps he's not handling this issue as effectively or reasonably as he thinks. Personally, I still think Paramount+ should return the episode to its platform, but maybe it's good for us to remember that we shouldn't put Fielder on a pedestal. 

On the bright side, "Horseback Riding/Man Zone" is still available on other streaming services like Max, which there's a good chance you're already subscribed to if you're watching "The Rehearsal." Max subscribers still have the freedom to watch Fielder fight against Taiga, one jacket at a time.