By Matt Collette

When the NU ‘ Improv’d troupe took the stage at afterHOURS Tuesday no topic was off-limits, from Lindsay Lohan, the romantic prospects of second cousins or the similarities between shoes and the Nazi party.

About 160 students attended the hour-long show, NU ‘ Improv’d’s first of the semester. The performance featured several improvisation games. One would introduce the game and its performers, then stay to the sidelines as the others performed.

The first game, one of NU ‘ Improv’d’s favorites, they said, was “Rant.” Four comedians were each given a topic to rant about individually. Soon all four were shouting.

“I love ‘Rant,'”said Tushar Patel, president of NU ‘ Improv’d. “Me and ‘Rant’ are going to have babies.”

Another game was “Genre Switch,’ where two performers acted out a scene that started out as professional wrestling in space – an audience suggestion – but changed as another improv member shouted out new genres: a high school play and a space opera.

Though when they were given a genre they didn’t understand, order diminished.

“Spaghetti western!” shouted the game’s moderator. Performer Samantha Soloman, a middler communication studies major, however, didn’t understand the term.

“There are lots of guns in this saloon, where we serve noodles,” Soloman said with an Italian accent.

However, even when the scene broke down, the audience laughed.

Before almost every game, NU ‘ Improv’d solicited audience suggestions, and the excited crowd shouted their ideas for everything from an event on campus (“speed dating at Ruggles”), to a murder weapon (“a rubber chicken”).

“I think we had an awesome show,” said Nicole DeRosiers, a junior communication and cinema studies major. “Good turnout and an excited audience really helped that.”

Middler physics major Dylan McDowell said he enjoyed Tuesday’s show, the first improvisational event he ever attended at Northeastern.

“My favorite scene was the one where they switched genres over and over again,” he said.

The show ended with, ‘World’s Worst,” a crowd favorite and an NU ‘ Improv’d standard. Audience members shouted out categories, and one or more of the players acted out the world’s worst version of that topic. Some categories included: world’s worst self-help book, world’s worst reality show and world’s worst police officer.

The NU ‘ Improv’d performers said they were happy with the quality of their show.

“The best part of the show was when we got our first really good laugh,” Soloman said.

Others, like DeRosiers, said they were satisfied with the show as a whole.

“Honestly, it’s all a blur right now. It went by so fast, but there was nothing weak in that show,” she said.