Music Now Icing on the Comic’s Cake : Hugh Fink’s Stage Persona Evolves as Violin Takes New Role in the Act

Comedian Hugh Fink used to wield a violin throughout his performances, like some sort of very hip Henny Youngman. He wouldn’t always play the violin. In fact, the false starts--as he would almost begin playing before launching into another routine--became one of his act’s running jokes. But he always had the instrument in hand.

Not anymore. These days, as part of the evolution of his stage persona and presentation, the violin stays in its case until Fink--who appears tonight at the Irvine Improvisation--is really ready to play it.

“The relationship between the violin and me is definitely changing,” Fink, 28, explained over dinner in a Santa Monica restaurant recently. “In the last year, I’ve tried to play the violin and have gone more for selling the other aspects of my act--the character impressions and offbeat stuff.

“When I got into comedy I definitely was a variety act; my best material revolved around the violin, and if I wasn’t using the violin, the stuff I was doing was mediocre. At worse, it used to be like Linus’ blanket: It was there all the time and if a routine wasn’t working, I would always go to the violin--a sure-fire way to win the audience back. But now if it’s in the case, locked up on stage, I don’t have that option.

“I’d like to feel that the violin is kind of icing on the cake, that if an audience is watching me for 45 minutes, I’ll establish certain themes and certain things in my act and then I bring the violin out and they (think) ‘What’s this--does he really play?’ So it’s like a treat.”

When Fink does choose to play, he ain’t fiddlin’ around. He began his formal training on the instrument when he was 6 and continued until he was 21, including a period of study in Paris. Moreover, even the strictly verbal side of his act reflects some of the tenets and techniques he learned during his musical education.

“It has occurred to me more and more that my whole approach to stand-up and writing is totally based on my experience with violin,” he said. In the broad sense, Fink said, he structures his performance as if it were a musical composition, gradually building toward crescendo until the ending is “like a down stroke of a symphony.”

A more specific influence is evident in his extensive use of the “callback,” a stand-up device that involves repeating part of a joke--sometimes with a slight variation--one or more times. “I think the reason I love callbacks so much,” Fink said, “is that one of my favorite conventions of classical music is theme and variation, where a composer introduces a melody and then keeps bringing it back in different keys or different rhythms. That’s what a callback is.”

The violin’s not the only aspect of his act that has changed. Whereas Fink used to take the stage casually clad, often in a Hawaiian shirt, for a recent performance he dressed in a rather conservative suit and a natty tie. He explained that while he doesn’t always wear the suit, a nice shirt and tie have become standard for club appearances.

And, as with ditching the violin, this was no frivolous decision. “As my persona has developed, it’s affected the way I feel about my presentation,” Fink said. “I felt that it reached the point where my act was more sophisticated than the way I was physically presenting myself, that the days of the naive Indiana guy--which is what I was when I moved out here (in 1983)--have ended.”

For college engagements, though, he still opts for casual garb “because it’s so crucial there that they view you as one of them.” He knows whereof he speaks, having logged nearly 50 college shows so far in 1989 with another 30 scheduled before the end of the year. Just on the strength of those first 50 shows, he’s already been nominated for Campus Comedian of the Year honors awarded by the National Assn. for Campus Activities (NACA).

If the NACA prize comes through, it will hardly be Fink’s first victory as a comic. He was attending New York University when he decided to enter a college student competition, sponsored by Columbia Pictures. At the time, the only vaguely similar experience he had was hosting a radio show, for which he wrote a variety of comedy material. Nonetheless, he won the contest.

Encouraged by his victory--and by the response he drew with two appearances at New York’s Comic Strip, the prize for winning the contest--he decided to move to Los Angeles in pursuit of a stand-up career. Once out here, he worked during the day as a clerk at an entertainment business management firm, performing at night as an unpaid regular at the Comedy Store and anywhere else he could secure stage time.

Then, in 1985, he entered another comedy competition co-sponsored by the L.A. Cabaret comedy club in Encino and Valley Magazine. He won that , a victory which carried the title “The Funniest Person in the Valley.” Fink recalled that he came into the office the Monday after winning and announced, “ ‘I won! I’m the funniest comic in the Valley.’ The senior partner said ‘That’s great, Hugh. Unfortunately, this is Century City. Get back to work.’ ”

Hugh Fink performs tonight at 8:30 at the Improvisation, 4255 Campus Drive, Irvine. Tickets: $7. Information: (714) 854-5455.