NIU’s College of Law will benefit from a dinner and a Chicago Bar Association road company production this Saturday of the “Christmas Spirits” show titled “Lex Miserables.”

The proceeds from the dinner will establish a computer lab, which will be available for use by law students, in NIU’s David C. Shapiro Law Library. The computer lab will not be on-line with the NIU mainframe.

Mike Smigiel, president of NIU’s student law association, said, “The computers, software and other equipment will supplement to the computer donated last year by a first-year law student who wished to remain anonymous.

Leonard Strickman, dean of the NIU law school, said, “During its first run each December, this renowned production, written, produced and performed by Chicago lawyers, including some of our alumni, is the hardest ticket in town to get.”

Smigiel said, “‘Lex Miserables’ parodies the Broadway show of the same name using Chicago and national politics. Everyone is trying to correct us on the spelling (‘Lex’ should be ‘Les’), but Lex is a pun on the computer system used in law studies.”

Cocktails are scheduled for 6 p.m. in the Duke Ellington Ballroom in the Holmes Student Center, dinner will be at 7 p.m. and the show will begin at 8:30 p.m.

Two of NIU’s alumni will be performing: Mary Milano, a 1978 graduate who now works for the law firm of Baker and Mackenzie at the Prudential Plaza in downtown Chicago, and Janet Pioli, a 1984 graduate with Cook, Wetzel, and Egan Ltd. on LaSalle Street in Chicago.

Tickets for the show are $35 per person; whole tables of six or eight may be reserved. Sue Mellard, administrative secretary to the Strickman, said, “About two hundred tickets have been sold at this time, but there may be more sold before Saturday.”