Metropolis Performing Arts Centre is celebrating its 25th season with two new individuals in key positions.
Jeff Award-winning director, performer, and playwright Johanna McKenzie Miller is the theater company’s new artistic director.
Jill Geimer is the new president of a restructured Board of Directors.
Johanna McKenzie Miller is the new artistic director of Metropolis Performing Arts Centre in Arlington Heights. (Brandon Dahlquist)
Lombard resident McKenzie Miller said that it was the people who work at the theater that made her decide to accept the position of artistic director.
She said that when she directed “Cinderella” at the theater last year, a problem arose during the tech process, but the staff and leadership came together to solve it.
“I was inspired and I felt supported by the people working at Metropolis. It felt like a family making it happen,” McKenzie Miller said.
In her new role, she said, “We are going to try and hopefully succeed at steering Metropolis to continue the success they had in the past season—the quality of shows; the level of professionalism.”
McKenzie Miller is hoping to have the theater take on other projects as ambitious as “Cinderella.”
She hopes to stage big shows “that theaters with much larger budgets have struggled with and bring it to our space — it’s an intimate space — and design it, rethink it, conceive of it so that we can tell these beautiful stories and share this gorgeous music,” McKenzie Miller said.
The artistic director isn’t planning to make immediate changes. “It’s a really, really busy place so right now I am listening and trying to figure out the challenges,” she said.
There are two more shows on this season’s schedule, “Rock of Ages,” from May 1-25, and “Ken Ludwig’s Dear Jack, Dear Louise,” July 24-Aug. 3.
McKenzie Miller’s future plans for Metropolis include starting a Theatre for Young Audiences. Currently shows in this category are presented by outside companies, such as Alphabet Soup and Chicago Kids Company. “We’re exploring producing our own versions of that like a lot of the other theaters do,” she said.
She is also working on the theater’s upcoming “25th Anniversary Gala: The Roaring 20s” on April 12.
In addition, McKenzie Miller is busy planning next season’s shows — and deciding if there’s one in that list that she can direct.
But her priority will be her new position, she indicated.
“I want to make sure that I am available to do the artistic director job and that the theater is well-supported and continues to grow,” McKenzie Miller said. “That is what is in the forefront in my mind.”
McKenzie Miller has worked at the most acclaimed theater companies in the Chicago area, including Music Theater Works, Drury Lane Theatre, Marriott Theatre, Steppenwolf Theatre, Chicago Shakespeare Theater, and many more. She is a co-founder of Lombard Children’s Theater Workshop and She Inspires Productions.
New Board President Jill Geimer of Glenview has a general theater degree from Purdue University but chose a career in human resources, initially at Universal Studios Florida. “I fell in love with the whole process of helping the actors and being a part of it,” she recalled.
Jill Geimer is the new president of the Board of Directors of Metropolis Performing Arts Centre in Arlington Heights. (Rena Durham)
Geimer returned to Chicago and earned a master’s degree in human resources from Loyola University and a second master’s degree in community counseling from Loyola.
Geimer’s first experience at Metropolis was in 2022 when her young daughter, who is an actor, was cast as Tiny Tim in “A Christmas Carol” at the theater. As she attended rehearsals with her daughter, Geimer became involved with Metropolis.
“I had heard there had been some HR challenges in the past,” Geimer said, so she volunteered to help because of her expertise in that area.
“Then I met Mayor Tom Hayes of Arlington Heights and he was looking to fill the president’s position at the Board of Directors and offered me the role,” Geimer said. “My marching orders were to refresh the board with some new members and really build up the business side — which is fundraising and creating an HR environment that is really healthy for all of the artists.”
Despite having a full-time day job as the chief HR officer for a global education company, Triumph Education Group, Geimer has enthusiastically taken on the volunteer position as board president.
“Metropolis is really special,” she explained. “It is this theater and performing arts school unlike anything you’re going to find in the City of Chicago. We have acts that are coming through and we market those shows, and you’ll get a really nice quality set of classes for youth actors—tap dance, jazz, how to be an actor. It’s a really unique place so I wanted to do anything I could to help continue to grow it.”
Geimer leads a Board of Directors that includes Jeff Hyslop, vice president; Stephanie Hoover, treasurer; Sue Thomas, secretary; and directors Maria Zeller Brauer; Tony Calzaretta; Carla Chan; Dave Kunicki; and Ilona House. Geimer indicated that the members of the Board of Directors bring a variety of critical skills to their work on the board. Everybody on the board is new except Brauer and Calzaretta.
The board has monthly meetings. “We’re there to help fix problems, leverage resources, support our plays,” Geimer said. “For me personally, coming from an HR background, I check in with employees.” She wants the employees and actors to share any concerns or complaints they have with her so she can help resolve them.
“That’s a huge part of why I joined Metropolis,” Geimer said. “I wanted to make sure it was a safe, inclusive place.”
Myrna Petlicki is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/03/18/metropolis-center-25th-anniversary/