There will be a new Hypocrite-in-Chief beginning with the 2011-12 season—but don’t expect major changes in mission. Sean Graney announced on January 14 that he is stepping down as artistic director for the company he founded in 1997 and has shepherded through over 40 productions, including the current hit run of The Pirates of Penzance (running through January 30 at the Chopin studio). But his successor, Halena Kays, is a company member with long roots in Chicago theatre, including her stint as founder and artistic director for Barrel of Monkeys .

The decision to leave was Graney’s—and he also suggested that the board hire Kays to replace him, given her background in building a company like Barrel of Monkeys from the ground up.

“Doing anything for 14 years can make you frustrated with it,” says Graney. “There were insurmountable problems that I could not personally surmount. My skill set in running the Hypocrites only let me help the company so far.”

Graney has also been increasingly in demand at theatres both in town ( Chicago Children’s Theatre , Court Theatre , and Steppenwolf Theatre ) and out of town (Milwaukee Repertory Theatre).

Kays, who has been pursuing her MFA in directing at the University of Texas at Austin for the past three years, worked with The Hypocrites in their productions of Oedipus and Maria Irene Fornes’ Mud, and has also worked with Steppenwolf Theatre and The Neo-Futurists . According to Kays, Graney “began planting the idea [of taking over the company] this past summer. I wasn’t sure where I was going when I finish up [in Austin] in May. I spent about a month in New York this past fall to take a little break. I didn’t want to just assume that I would go back to Chicago. But once the idea was planted, I realized I’m a Midwestern girl and Chicago is my town. It’s where I can do the work I want to make and where the people I love work their asses off every day.”

But Kays also says that she insisted that Graney agree to stay on to direct two (out of three) shows per season for the next two seasons. “I don’t think we’re in a big rush to re-define what the company is about,” says Kays. She and Graney are collaborating on planning the 2011-12 season.

“We’ve always had the goal of building an infrastructure that equals the maturity of the art,” said Hypocrites board president Bob Webb. “Since the company has been around for 14 seasons, the art is very well defined. When I came on [the board], the infrastructure was very primitive and it’s come a long way, but we really need to do more to raise the money to make the productions sing.”

Currently, says Webb, the company operates on an annual budget of about $166,000. “One of our stated goals was to find ways to pay artists more, and then the recession hit and we had issues with bringing in more revenue,” says Webb. “So now we’ve regrouped and hopefully we can focus on those ideas again.”

“Artistically, the Hypocrites are really sound,” says Kays. “My job is making sure what’s behind the art is really consistent and stable. Megan [Wildebour, the managing director] will be working to make sure we have a really solid 10-year plan. I would really love to move us past the struggling point to a really solid point with living wages and health insurance. It took 10 years for Barrel of Monkeys to build to that point.”

Though putting Wildebour on staff two years ago added an experienced administrator (she had worked with several companies in New York before relocating to Chicago), Graney says with a laugh that “it became clear how unhelpful I am to her. It’s just true. There are just certain things that the artistic leadership needs to do to help out, and it’s not just something I have the energy to do. When I’m out of town, I can’t help with the press releases, or go to all the fundraisers.”

Graney doesn’t rule out the possibility of taking an artistic director’s job elsewhere if the opportunity arises with the right theatre.

“I would like to control the mission of a larger organization that already has a lot of support behind it. I feel like I could really help an established company like that, and it would be nice to be where I’m getting paid for it so I could cut down on my other commitments.”