Nathan for You

Nathan for You is an American docu-reality comedy television series starring Canadian comedian Nathan Fielder. The series was created by Fielder and Michael Koman and premiered on February 28, 2013, on the American cable television network Comedy Central. In the general premise of the series, Fielder plays a fictionalized off-kilter version of himself, trying to use his business background and life experiences to help struggling companies and people, frequently offering them outlandish strategies, parodying the methods of marketing and management consultants. Twenty-seven of the show's 32 episodes follow this structure as applied to one or more businesses in the Southern California area, with five others ("The Claw of Shame", "The Hero", "A Celebration", "The Anecdote", and "Finding Frances") departing from the business advice format to showcase other comedic premises. The series ran for four seasons. In October 2018, Comedy Central confirmed that Nathan for You had ended, with Fielder deciding to focus on other projects. It received acclaim from critics, several of whom considered it one of the best TV shows of the 2010s. Background The series centers on Nathan Fielder, a business school graduate and consultant whose aim is to help struggling businesses. His marketing proposals are often outlandish and elaborate. One of the show's long-running story arcs concerns Fielder and his social awkwardness. Throughout episodes, his confidence is eroded as his ideas fail. In the show's first season, Fielder is unaware people do not enjoy his company. The character is based on Fielder's real life and his own struggles with social anxiety; he has noted that he did not want the character to "feel like a comedy character" but one that delivers the "most authentic moments from myself." Production Nathan for You was created by comedian Nathan Fielder and writer Michael Koman. The show evolved out of segments on the Canadian news satire series This Hour Has 22 Minutes titled "Nathan On Your Side," wherein Fielder played a consumer advocate. The show was greenlit following the cancellation of Jon Benjamin Has a Van, which Fielder also wrote and appeared in. Part of the series' inspiration came from Fielder's fascination with the subprime mortgage crisis, and how he found that it was rooted in "these personal moments between people where someone senses something's wrong, but they don't want to speak up."