‘The Road’ at Zephyr; ‘Twelfth Night’ at Occidental; ‘The Coarse Acting Show’ by Company of Angels; ‘Hot l Baltimore’ at Adler Conservatory

Henry Lee Lucas and Ottis Toole drift across America, killing people, in “The Road” at the Zephyr.

Watching David Earl Jones’ docudrama about the pair, you’re struck by the glint in the eye of scrawny, middle-aged Henry (Craig Stout) and younger, hunkier Ottis (Kelly Edwards). Bathed in Robert Mellette’s eerie light and haunted by Steve Stevens’ spooky sound track, these two performances yield some creepy moments.

If, however, Jones is going for something beyond creating a chill in the air, he doesn’t achieve it. For example, he neglects to mention that the real Lucas later claimed that he had greatly exaggerated his body count--and that reporters and the Texas attorney general concluded that his second story was the more truthful, that his earlier boasting of hundreds of deaths was a hoax.

Incorporating all of this into the play would have made it far more complex and fascinating. As it is, it’s hard to draw any conclusions from “The Road” beyond the obvious don’t-hitchhike-with-strangers lessons.

Even on that level, it’s easy to feel superior to the only two victims whose murders are actually simulated on stage. One of them is a slatternly teen-ager (Leah Teweles) who married Lucas and became an accomplice in his crimes, while the other is a snooty yuppie (Catherine Curry).

The murder of the latter occurs at a moment that feels like the climax of the play, but there is no apparent reason why Jones selected this particular incident, from among the hundreds allegedly perpetrated by Lucas and Toole, to occupy this crucial spot in his narrative. The subsequent, concluding scene has an abrupt quality, at least as staged by Jones.

Frank Simons and Robin Stober contribute stalwart portraits of a preacher and his wife from the “American Gothic” school. Set designer Mark Fite not only brought the shell of an old Mercury on stage but also lifted the guts of a junked car (or cars) up over the action, creating a striking image of roadside waste.

At 7456 Melrose Ave., Thursdays through Saturdays at 8 p.m., Sundays at 7 p.m., through Sept. 10. Tickets: $12.50-$15; (213) 466-1767.

‘Twelfth Night’ Director James Martin placed the Occidental Summer Drama Festival’s “Twelfth Night” in a Viennese wine garden at the turn of the century. Designer Susan Gratch made sure that the outdoor Remsen Bird Hillside Theater is “canopied in bowers,” to quote Shakespeare. Couples waltz past the flowers, and lights glimmer on the trees that fill the horizon. It’s a pretty picture.

Some of the actors seem a bit callow. Michael Wright is such a thin Toby Belch that one wonders if Malvolio has indeed locked up the cakes and ale. This Toby also looks younger than his niece Olivia, and Karen Musich plays Olivia as if she were hardly bothered by her brother’s death.

But Jill Ackles’ Viola, Tom Shelton’s Malvolio (doing his caged scene with only his hands visible), Morgan Rusler’s Sir Andrew Aguecheek (bicycling around the stage) , Winifred Walsh’s Maria and Kevin Pariseau’s Feste are all at home in their roles.

A few moments are diminished by the great outdoors and (on opening night) the scarcity of theatergoers. But cutting through the distances, Jonathan C. Wyman’s lighting design highlights the characters at the first mention of their names. The effect is vaguely like a paint-by-numbers drawing, but it does make the exposition very accessible.

The theater is in the northeast corner of the Occidental College campus, just off Campus Road. “Twelfth Night” plays at 8:30 p.m. Saturday and next Friday , Aug. 21, 25 and 30 (in repertory with three other productions). Tickets: $9; (213) 259-2772. ‘The Coarse Acting Show’ Company of Angels is marking time with “The Coarse Acting Show” at Theatre of Arts. Four one-act spoofs of classic theater pieces, as they might be presented by an incompetent band of amateur thespians, this show is long on exertion and short on laughter.

The subjects of the spoofs are “Moby Dick,” Chekhov, Shakespeare and Coward. The Coward sketch, last on the program, is the briefest and sharpest of the four. It’s built on the premise that the leading actor (Michael Adler) cuts himself on a broken champagne bottle, thereby turning the stage and the neatly starched cottons worn by the Coward characters into a bloody disaster area. It’s directed with unabashed energy by Don Oscar Smith.

The accidents and missed cues that mess up the other sketches aren’t as brazen as the blood in the Coward sketch, and the humor is more trivial and tiresome. Susan Cartwright Kussman connects the sketches with inept piano interludes, which are funny at first but wear out their welcome by the end.

The skits were drawn from British humorist Michael Green’s “The Art of Coarse Acting,” which was also the basis (and the title) of a Santa Monica Playhouse production in 1984.

At 4128 Wilshire Blvd., Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m., Sundays at 5 p.m. Tickets: $10-$12.50; (213) 466-1767. ‘The Hot l Baltimore’ The Stella Adler Conservatory dedicated a lovely little theater last March, with Adler herself on hand. So it was disappointing to discover that the Conservatory’s production of Lanford Wilson’s “Hot l Baltimore” isn’t in the new theater but rather in a harshly lit room off to the side, with metal folding chairs for seats.

The theater that was dedicated in March has not been certified as meeting earthquake standards, said a spokesman.

Of course the hotel lobby where Wilson’s play is set is supposed to be even drearier than the classroom that houses this production, so maybe director Arthur Mendoza thought that it was a fitting match of play and place. Unfortunately, the play seems equally dreary.

Three acts of watching colorful losers hang out in the lobby of a doomed hotel is at least one act too many, especially when the evening is lengthened even farther by entr’actes in which the actors silently go about their business while we listen to forlorn pop tunes. Kristina Loggia and Mark Ruffalo, as a pair of teen-age drifters, deliver the most focused performances.

At 1651 N. Argyle Ave., Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m., Sundays at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m., through Aug. 21. Tickets: $6-$7.50; (213) 465-0070.