Bohnen first came to Chicago in 1996 from Aspen Theatre-in-the-Park (now Theatre Aspen) with fellow producers Carol Loewenstern and John Stoddard. The three produced Chekhov’s The Seagull, along with Tom Stoppard’s Night and Day—which is, fittingly enough, slated to kick off Bohnen’s last season as artistic director this coming September—under the name Remy Bumppo Productions. Loewenstern and Stoddard didn’t stay on, but by 2001, Bohnen had incorporated Remy Bumppo Theatre Company as a non-profit. The company’s odd name carries echoes of its first triumvirate—the “Remy” part references Loewenstern’s cat, named for Remy Martin cognac, and “Bumppo” came from Bohnen’s black Labrador retriever, named for Natty Bumppo of James Fenimore Cooper’s Leatherstocking Tales.

Over the years of his leadership, the company has won acclaim for its lively stagings of classic and contemporary plays with a strong emphasis on language and cerebral wit, such as Stoppard, Shaw, Pinter, and Caryl Churchill. In recent years, they’ve also grown their “thinkTank” series, which has focused on plays about contemporary issues, such as immigration, ethnic identity, and national security. Talk-backs and panels with academics and other professionals have also been a strong component of the company’s programming.

But Bohnen says, “I didn’t start out with a dream of being an artistic director. I didn’t really get serious about theatre until I was about 40.” Though he plans to continue as a freelance director (he’ll be staging W. Somerset Maugham’s The Circle with American Players Theatre in Spring Green, Wisconsin, in August), Bohnen emphasizes that, after the rigors of running an Equity company, he is not interested in taking on another full-time administrative job—or even focusing exclusively on theatre

“Most of my close friends don’t have anything to do with the theatre,” he observes. “I want my real life back.” Among his possible plans are starting a bookstore and café in Wisconsin with friends and doing some script and screenplay doctoring.

Bohnen brought up the possibility of stepping down to the board about a year ago, and will be involved in interviewing candidates for his successor, though he is not officially part of the succession committee. “It’s time for me to stop and it’s better for the company to find someone who can run it for the next 10 or 15 years,” he says.

Though Remy Bumppo has had to do some belt-tightening in the last year or so and has made staff cuts, board president Karen Randolph says that the company’s current operating budget is between $750,000-$800,000. Their relationship with the Greenhouse Theater , where they have been in residence for most of Remy Bumppo ’s existence (dating back to when the space was run by Victory Gardens before they took over the Biograph— Remy Bumppo is in the 150-seat upstairs venue once occupied by long-gone Body Politic) remains solid, according to Randolph. She also emphasizes that there are no plans on the part of the board to radically re-tool the company mission.

“My way of describing it is that we do thought-provoking plays that thrill the ear and stir the heart,” says Randolph, who has been board president for two years. She also says, “We’re committed to being an ensemble-based company. We would certainly make that clear to candidates [for the artistic director position]. We definitely love the artistic associates we have and they’ve been very dedicated and we want them to remain part of the company. I haven’t spoken to them individually to know what their feelings are about any of this, but we’re in the process and we’ll have meetings to talk about [the transition].” The current line-up of artistic associates includes Greg Matthew Anderson, Annabel Armour (who, Randolph says, is on the succession committee), David Darlow, Shawn Douglass, Linda Gillum, and Nick Sandys. (Artistic associate Joe Van Slyke passed away in 2007 after a battle with cancer.)

The job description has not yet been posted, but Randolph says that they are open to internal candidates as well as other Chicago artists and out-of-town directors. For his part, Bohnen, who will direct two shows for Remy Bumppo next season (Night and Day and Edward Albee’s The Goat, Or Who Is Sylvia?), says he believes that the committee will be looking for “somebody who shares the aesthetic and also has that sense of treating people with respect. That matters to me, anyway.”