Cover Boy: The Non-Musical

article by Andrew Roberts, 2011

In a full beard and a sleeveless black bicycle jersey, Phil van Hest follows a five-hour writing binge and a sweaty bike ride through the thick summer heat with a goblet of beer and a careful diagnosis of American debt. He chews over his words with deliberation and candor; the subject of his conversation is well-researched, but the words are improvised and sincere, as one of the city's favorite IndyFringe Festival icons deliberates the material of his newest one-man show, Motherbanking Bankholes.

His long, distinctive beard would be impractical for most men in late July, but it becomes van Hest; it is one of few definable characteristics of one of the most enigmatic men you will ever know.

He is equal parts artist, performer, philosopher, comedian, writer, anthropologist, critic, psychologist, teacher, student and activist. That's not much of a marketable brand, but it is Phil's — and it is all his own. Think of a modern-day Khalil Gibran, with a few more anus jokes.

Even when writing his own promotions, Phil van Hest struggles to define himself as an entertainer. A comedian evokes images of a microphone and a brick wall, and that's not quite right. "Philosopher" evokes images of required reading, and he uses the word "fuck" a couple dozen times too many for his work to find its way into an IPS curriculum. 

While van Hest insists that comedy is simply the numbing agent to dull the mosquito bite of the difficult truths he explores, it is the laughter — not the universal truths — that fills the seats. He does both very well, but the two are mutually dependent on one another for his success.

"I came to this after three years of telling penis jokes for a living," van Hest says of his current string of one-man shows. This spring he moved to Indianapolis to pursue a career of comedy/activism/philosophy/theater/writing. "There's money in dick jokes," he says. "But it felt irresponsible from an artistic integrity standpoint. I try at all times to — and this is really the death nail — educate while making people laugh.

"I try to be factual, accurate and well-researched. But the trick is presenting it in a way that's not fucking boring."

Trying to find God

In Indianapolis, van Hest says, more people have got on board than anywhere else.

After stopping through town the last few summers for IndyFringe, van Hest decided to take his search for a sustainable lifestyle to Indianapolis on a more permanent basis. He has a television-free, automobile-free life in the oasis of Rocky Ripple, where he spends his days writing.

Ideally, van Hest wants to live in a commune of organic farmers, living off the fat o' the lan'. Fully aware that all the American frontiers have been claimed, he seeks a life of communal-based living where he can grow his organic veggies and eat them, too.

"I don't want to need as much, but to start a commune I'm going to need some capital before I can live within a more locally dependent network. It's an illusion to think you can live independently," he says. "I want to build a village, but you'd have to find a group of Amish people or Luddites who are willing to raise their people on this land so that there would be generations to take care of you, but still be close enough to a hospital. And have some health insurance. It's possible, but you have to reinvent the wheel.

"It seemed like that concept was much more available here than in California."

Van Hest doesn't have the answer to America's collective financial ruin, but he wants his audience to consider the heart of the question in his new show, Motherbanking Bankholes, which he will unveil at IndyFringe. This year's effort is a deviation from the broad sociopolitical spectrum of past shows.

"Before, I've always taken on vague philosophical constructs," van Hest says of his latest endeavor, which is largely an affront against the imaginary and asinine concept of American debt. "But this is the first time I've tried to attach the premise to something concrete."

Van Hest finds the nebulous monster of American's financial system — where we play a game in which we strive to be "good at debt" and get the best "debt score" — to be a condescending and dehumanizing beast of our own making.

"It's a faith-based system, and I have a problem with that for the same reason I had a problem with organized religions when I was younger," he explains. "I'm just supposed to accept that someone has a plan, that I don't understand that plan and that I have to just move on with my life. We're supposed to be comforted that we don't know what it is and never will; just be comforted that some larger benevolent figure is taking care of it for you.

"It's like the rapture; it's like an imaginary system. We created it; it's so far-flung at this point no one knows what it is. Even the people who are paid to know what it is don't know what it is. I feel insulted by this notion; if you want to know what's really going on it shouldn't be that hard to find out. But the fact that it's being purposely hidden, it's like spending your whole life trying to literally find God."

So how do we gain independence from this rat race of financial ambition and never-ending debt?

"We could build a commune. But you know what we'd need to do that? A loan."

The chicken and the egg

In August of 2008, van Hest performed for a crowd of about nine people at ComedySportz on a weekend afternoon. He got modest laughs, but there was a lot of integrity and potency behind the material. That evening I mulled over the performance at great length, trying to figure out what I had just seen. It was a hybrid between stand-up comedy and an epic one-man show best suited for an HBO special. He had the confidence needed to not be funny every 10 seconds, to go minutes without a laugh and trust that his material is working in layers toward a larger experience. Three years later, neither van Hest nor I still know exactly what it was I saw that day.

"Marketing has been a huge problem because after five or six years of doing this, I still couldn't tell you what it is that I do," he says. "Comedic monologues with a philosophical spin?"

Part of the reason his approach to performance art is so unchartered is because it is almost impossible to tell a person how the world works without immediately alienating them. Typically a comedian has to build a reputation over the course of decades to earn the privilege of an audience's interest in his genuine ideologies. Van Hest instills a sense of trust and mutual respect with his crowd instantaneously.

Of course, like anything, it's not for everyone.

The first review he ever received was of his first performance, in which the critic complained that the material was "too smart" and used too many four-syllable words such as "in-ter-est-ing" and "wat-er-mel-on."

Though the nearsighted review provided a hilarious retrospective anecdote for van Hest, the entertainment industry's penchant for catchphrases and characterizations is a harsh daily reality.

"It has crossed my mind every day for the last five years with increasing intensity per day," he says. But he doesn't see dumbing down his material as a viable alternative.

"I could fall down and make you laugh. But to really reach someone and help them realize something that will make their experience of life more full or understand another human being or realize their anger is misplaced, those are the reactions I'm trying to evoke."

The comedy and the philosophy go hand-in-hand, and to discuss which came first and which is more relevant quickly becomes a conversation about the chicken and the egg. Van Hest's comedic brevity makes the sociopolitical commentary accessible and harmless, even to a potentially hostile audience.

Where most of us fall for the trap of expressing our opinions as truth, van Hest makes a point to distinguish the two — even when people are paying to hear that opinion.

"Once you realize that you don't own the truth and nobody does, it starts to become laughable and ludicrous to take someone serious who tries to take ownership of it," van Hest says, with quiet, fatherly poise. "Then you realize that they're just trying to find happiness and avoid suffering, and you can have empathy for them, because that's what we're all doing. My methods may seem ludicrous to them. So unless you know that you are each other, then it's hard to care about each other."

Moving into the future

After this year van Hest is officially retiring from the Fringe circuit, though he still plans to do the Indy edition each summer. Next on the horizon is a monthly news satire show at the Fringe Building, entitled "Funny About That."

Van Hest plans to podcast it and try to build a following, and become a recognizable presence in Indianapolis theater, then possibly move into television. But to get there and make it self-sustaining, van Hest knows that he will need sponsors. "If you're not shitty," van Hest says, leaning in toward the recorder, speaking to potential investors, "I'll let you be a part of it."

"For all my railing against the monetary system, I still want to succeed at it. Because I want to have kids, I want to not live in fear of financial ruin, but I also have to do it my way," he says.

If it doesn't work out and the move to Indianapolis turns out to be for naught, does van Hest need the performance arts to consider himself successful?

"Fuck no. I used to, but lately I've moved more toward apathy. I want to start a religion of apathyism. 'Shit happens?' It doesn't if you don't give a shit. I've been redefining my own concept of success, and I don't want that to be tied to other people's opinions of what I do. I don't need that.

"If I had a job-job that I felt was beneficial to other people, I'd do that. But right now, this is the best idea I've had — having my own 'thing.' 'Thing' subject to interpretation."