Second City’s National Touring Company performed before a standing-room only crowd in Duke Ellington Ballroom Tuesday night.

This particular performance showed much of Second City’s “new stuff,” said Dave Reidy, a Phi Kappa Sigma member who arranged for the troupe’s visit to NIU.

“All scenes in the peformance were based on improvisation,” Second City member Jane Lynch said.

The seven-member group performed skits with themes dealing with current issues. Birth control, the stock market crash, menopause, homosexuality, infidelity, religious scandels and pot smoking were among the group’s repertoire of skits.

“We perform material someone else created, even though we studied comedy improvisation while training with Second City,” performer Ken Olshansky said.

Former NIU student Jim Murray drove from Chicago to see Second City perform here. “I think they’re really fun and their improvisation is excellent. It would be pretty tough to drag two people from the audience to do that,” he said.

Members from the touring company who performed included Ken Olshansky, Jill Talley, Greg Hollimon, Jane Lynch, Michael McCarthy, Dave Sinker, and Tim Meadows.

eidy said about 1,800 tickets were sold. Proceeds from the performance will go to Skull’s philanthropies, the Campus Child Care Center and Special Physical Education Clinic (SPEC).