Comedy is back in the Santa Clarita Lanes. And Pam McGeary is back in comedy.
“Pam McGeary’s Comedy Alley,” which just started this summer, is a recurring comedy show featuring a variety of stand-up headliners and local comedians that takes place every other Tuesday at 7 p.m. at Santa Clarita Lanes on Soledad Canyon Road in Saugus.
“There used to be a comedy program at Santa Clarita Lanes called ‘Vic Dunlop’s Comedy Alley,'” said Sean McBride, who produces the show with McGeary. “It was incredibly popular. He was my mentor in comedy, but he passed away in 2011. There hasn’t been a professional comedy show at SC Lanes since then until Pam and I revived it. As the reverend for Vic, we called it ‘Pam McGeary’s Comedy Alley.’ He’s there in spirit.”
McGeary was a stand-up comedian and actress in the 1980s and 1990s, even appearing in the first-ever “Comic Relief” special on HBO with Whoopie Goldberg, Robin Williams and Billy Crystal, where she played Princess Diana of Wales. She stopped working in 1996 to start a family. When she became a mother, she had acted in a few shows, but ultimately she couldn’t be there for her two children while also working the crazy hours that would be required to be successful.
At home, she helped her then-husband with his career and assisted friends with interior design of their homes. This eventually led her to go to school and get a degree in architecture. In 2001, she began working part-time from home on interior design projects.
She did this while her children were in school, but she worked full-time when she could, and she managed just fine. But then, in 2016, she and her husband divorced.
It didn’t take long before she felt like getting back into comedy.
“Right before the pandemic, and it was kind of ridiculous, I told everyone, ‘You know what, I’m going to do stand-up again,'” McGeary said. “What a great idea, perfect idea. And suddenly, bam, God shut down the world. And people said, ‘Do you think that was because you said you wanted to get back into comedy? Do you think you should see that as a sign?'”
She didn’t. She stayed true to course, initially doing comedy on Zoom video conferences when that was the only option in town. When clubs reopened, she bought an RV and began traveling around the country, going from show to show and perfecting her act as the “newbie” that she was.
But other aspiring comedians couldn’t believe that she, too, was “new.”
“A guy – a young guy – comes up to me and says, ‘Well, you’ve got a really solid 15 minutes right off the bat. How long did it take you?’ And I say, ‘Yeah, 57 years.’ Oddly enough, I still talk about the same things I did in the ’80s, because now I’m dating again. It’s sad that I still talk about how dating sucks. It sucked in my 20s and it sucks in my 60s.”
McGeary, who is now exactly 60 years old, is happy to be back on the comedy scene. And although she lives in an RV, she only parked it at the Valencia Travel Village in Castaic a little over two years ago. She’s been there ever since, but, she said, after speaking on the phone with The Signal earlier this week, she was on her way to making an offer on a home on Soledad Canyon Road in Santa Clarita.
Even more exciting for her, McGeary said, is being able to perform in the city she now calls her hometown.
And while the show, Pam McGeary’s Comedy Alley, currently runs every other Tuesday, McBride expressed hope that if they can maintain the strong momentum and sold-out crowds, it will be performed weekly in the future.
So far, he said, the show has been well received, and each show features different comedians. Many of the comedians come from late-night television, he said, or are regulars at venues like the Laugh Factory and the Comedy Store.
According to McGeary, every show at Santa Clarita Lanes was packed and there was a lot of laughter. The comedians love it, too.
“We bring top headliners who headline all over the country to Santa Clarita and charge a lot less than what they charge at the Improv or the Ice House or the Comedy Store,” she said. “It’s a really great venue for comedy … and everyone who comes in there, including the headliners, turns around and says, ‘When am I coming back?’ My phone rings off the hook with people asking, ‘Why haven’t I done your room yet?'”
The next show is scheduled for Tuesday, August 27th at Santa Clarita Lanes. For more information and tickets, visit SantaClaritaLanes.com or call the bowling alley at 661-254-0540.
