Laughs in the Fast Lane : ‘A Freeway Home Companion’ Drives Home Some Modern-Day Absurdities

If surviving Southern California’s tangle of freeways, carwashes and drive-up family dining requires a warped concept of community, imagine the satirical sense it takes to find a homespun feeling to it all.

That’s what Sandra Tsing Loh and Mel Green will attempt tonight in their performance of “A Freeway Home Companion” at the San Juan Capistrano Regional Library. The show, a takeoff on writer Garrison Keillor’s “A Prairie Home Companion,” pokes fun at life in Southern California through bogus nostalgia and personal storytelling.

“It’s like modern vaudeville or a variety show with wit,” says Loh. “There’s music interspersed with humor and drama.”

Past performances have included an office worker’s middle-of-the-night stream-of-consciousness account of what it’s like to be strung out on the corporate ladder. Skits have titles such as “The Tattered Palms Gazette: A Living Journal of Our Neighborhood,” the “Not-Ready for PBS Players Present a Vaguely Multicultural Underfunded Event” and the “Best of 1990s Arts Grant Rejectees.”

“Freeway,” which changes with every performance, has played to sellout crowds at Theatre/Theater in Hollywood since last October. Tonight’s show will be one of the last before a much-needed break, Loh said. She and Green plan to tackle other projects, among them a radio series pilot, and develop fresh material for “Freeway,” which will resume in September.

“In San Juan,” she said, “we will do a best-of-the-series show combining some of the most successful elements from previous performances.” The two will be joined by Mike Miller & His Starlite Orchestra, which consists of one, two or three people, depending on how many members are available.

Be prepared for off-the-wall stories and performance pieces from Green, who has written for “Saturday Night Live,” “SCTV” and is the author of two humor books: “Dudes: The Cult of Cool” and “Smart Women, Stupid Books.”

Loh, who was born in Newport Beach and grew up in Malibu, has a bachelor’s degree in physics from Caltech and a master’s in English literature from USC. But her piano studies, love of performing and wit eventually led to a performance-art career with a specialty in musical satire. Loh may be remembered for performing beneath the Harbor Freeway in Los Angeles for commuters stuck in rush-hour traffic during the opening of the Fringe Festival/LA in 1987. Another odd and widely publicized performance was “Night of the Grunion, “ in which Loh and a 35-piece orchestra assembled on a Malibu beach at midnight to perform a symphonic movement composed for the spawning fish.

Loh met Green, who grew up in Texas, when he was cast in “Too Full for Love,” a comedy Loh wrote that was performed at the Zephyr Theater in Los Angeles in 1987. The two eventually produced “Freeway” and plan to continue as a team.

“He’s wacky,” Loh said. “You have to be to find humor in the subjects we take on.”

“A Freeway Home Companion” will be presented tonight at 7 and 9 p.m. at the San Juan Capistrano Regional Library, 31495 El Camino Real, San Juan Capistrano. Suggested donation: $2. Presented by the Friends of the San Juan Capistrano Regional Library as part of its Multicultural Performing and Visual Arts Festival. Information: (714) 493-1752.