A 'Sketchy' Part ‘The Rehearsal’ Season 2 Hit Reddit Months Ago

Nathan Fielder has been generating a kind of cringeworthy television that I believe is unmatched by his contemporaries. He finds people who are so desperate to be on television that they will let their children sit in a sound proof box while pornstars bang right next to them. There was an episode of his old show, Nathan For You, when a bunch of parents allowed their kids to possibly be flashed by Fielder should he not undo a pair of handcuffs in time. The first season of The Rehearsal had a child actor get so close to Nathan, given the scenario, that he started calling him Daddy.

Fielder has found plenty of adults willing to embarrass and/or potentially scar themselves instead of their children. He has a real knack for finding people who will reveal deeply personal things in front of a camera. Still, when I heard the new season would be about airplane safety, I assumed the focus would shift. That theory doubled when the second episode made headlines because Fielder compared Paramount to Nazis. Now I have caught up on The Rehearsal, and it’s just as cringey as ever.

While Fielder is focusing on airline safety, particularly the communication between pilot and co-pilot, he’s still delving into people’s personal lives, should they let him (and they always do). He gets a co-pilot who is in a long-distance relationship to hash things out with his girlfriend, whom he assumes is flirting with other guys at her Starbucks job. To be fair, it seems like he may have been right, making the interaction even more awkward, as his gf admits that people flirt with her but that she doesn’t let things go too far, nor thinks the customers want them to (even though one bought her flowers). The conversation between them plays out in a fake cockpit and is agonizing.

But getting people to hash out their relationship while he watches on with a laptop wasn’t the only uncomfortable moment from the newest season of Fielder’s masterwork. He also revealed some details about himself, like how he used to be a Junior Producer on Canadian Idol who had to judge people before they went to the celebrity judges, something he describes as being incredibly difficult. So, he asked a bunch of airline co-pilots to do the same thing, and even created a fake singing show called Wings of Voice. Fielder set up the auditions in a similar manner to what he had to go through, filing people into stark white, empty rooms. But they went, and some folks caught onto the weirdness.

Comedian and former CONAN writer, Skyler Higley, found a Reddit post from eight months ago that is someone auditioning for Fielder’s fake show. It had been posted in an America’s Got Talent subreddit, along with many other commenters rightfully questioning the legitimacy of “Wings of Voice.” The post Higley shared goes as far as warning people not to audition for the competition lest they waste their time. And to be fair, that poster was definitely on to something.

“Just to update you guys, I got there and it was super weird and sketchy,” the post explained. “They have you in a parking garage, then walk you over eventually into the studio, which is just another big empty room. The song choices were super weird. I sang ‘House of the Rising Sun.’ … I was surprised because it was one dude who literally looked like he was an airline pilot and he gave no feedback and passed on me immediately when I was done. Unless you have a Mariah Carey voice, there’s no reason to waste your time.” Fantastic.

Fielder’s efforts have made their way into the real world before their release, but this one is a bit more low-key. It doesn’t have the viral nature of Dumb Starbucks or Pig Saves Goat, but dammit, it’s pretty incredible that folks sat around for almost a year wondering if anything was going to come of that bizarre singing competition they auditioned for. Now they know.