Writer: Christine Riccelli
Photographer: Duane Tinkey
Before the “Hadestown” opening in April, Jeff Chelesvig is cruising through the Des Moines Civic Center when a patron rushes up to him. “Congratulations,” he says, referring to Chelesvig’s upcoming retirement Aug. 31. “I’m happy for you, but I sure am sad for me.”
Others repeat that sentiment, emphatically, during what Chelesvig called his “pre-show ritual.” The stroll around the venue reveals, in a vivid microcosm, the multifaceted impact Chelesvig has made during his 30 years as president and CEO of Des Moines Performing Arts, as well as his accessible and personable style.
Nattily outfitted in a suit paired with practical Hoka sneakers, the 6-foot-7-inch northern Iowa native chats with several donors who tell him how much they enjoyed the behind-the-scenes tour during the show’s load-in earlier that day. Stepping into the 2,700-seat auditorium before it opens to the audience, he peeks at the last-minute stage preparations and reminds his tagalong visitor how the Civic Center’s unique architecture — without balconies or box seats — is an equalizing force “where everyone can see everyone else,” helping to create a sense of community.
In the lobby, he offers directions to a guest who appears to be confused. A few minutes later he stops to hug a woman who’d directed his mom’s choir. He lights up the most when he spots a group of high school students who scored deeply discounted tickets, thanks to robust donations for youth programming.
“I love seeing high school students here,” the 67-year-old Chelesvig says. “For some, it may be their first time seeing a Broadway show.”
Youth education, donor and patron relations, marketing, fundraising, facilities and human resource management — Chelesvig “can do it all and has done it all very well,” former DMPA board chairman E.J. Giovannetti said in an interview. “He’s leaving [DMPA] in great shape.”
BY THE NUMBERS
Impressive stats bear that out: More than 4.6 million people have attended DMPA’s Broadway shows over the past 30 years, with the Willis Broadway Series generating an estimated $57 million for the local economy each year. The DMPA team also raises about $4 million in donations annually and expects to sell 13,500 season tickets for the 2025-2026 series that starts this fall. Some 40,000 Iowa students make a field trip to the Civic Center to see a performance each year.
What’s more, DMPA has invested in more than 100 Broadway and off-Broadway productions and national tours since 2001, including “Dear Evan Hansen” and “Spamalot.” (See the highlights on page 112.) DMPA today encompasses not only the Civic Center and its smaller black-box Stoner Theater, but also Cowles Commons and the Temple for Performing Arts. Since Chelesvig joined in 1995, DMPA has invested about $45.4 million in facility upgrades and improvements.
DMPA is “far, far beyond” what it was when Chelesvig started, Giovannetti said. At the time, the Civic Center had operated mainly as a rental facility since it opened in 1979; it didn’t present shows or offer other programming. As such, “it was in poor financial shape,” said Giovannetti, who was on the board’s search committee and has remained Chelesvig’s mentor and friend for the past three decades.
“Whoever came on board had to put us on sound financial footing if we were going to survive,” added Giovannetti, a retired attorney. “The person had to know about the business side but also had to have fire in their belly. We wanted someone who wouldn’t be afraid of taking chances.”
At the time, Chelesvig was running the Bayfront Center and Mahaffey Theater in St. Petersburg, Florida, following stints at the Peoria (Illinois) Civic Center and the Mayo Civic Center in Rochester, Minnesota.
Chelesvig “was a guy on his way up,” Giovannetti said, and the fact that he grew up near Eagle Grove — a town of about 3,500 people some 95 miles north of Des Moines — was a big plus. “We wanted someone who knew Iowa. We wanted to offer programming that would [appeal] to all sorts of people in the state,” he recalled. “The committee knew Jeff understood that and would be accepted by the community he’d be working in.”
Joseph Giunta, who conducts the Des Moines Symphony, noted that Chelesvig’s arrival coincided with a period of downtown growth. “He had good timing on his side. He came when the city was beginning to define what it wanted to be when it grew up,” said Giunta, who has been one of Chelesvig’s close friends for the past 30 years. “There was an economic boom in the mid-1990s, and there was the hope that as the skyline grew, support for arts and cultural organizations would grow. Jeff understood that.”
FROM GOOD TO GREAT
The real key to Chelesvig’s success, Giunta believes, is his “complete commitment to understanding the difference between good and great,” a comment echoed by others. “He totally embraced the hard work, diligence and risk it takes to bring in high-quality shows.”
Giunta said “The Phantom of the Opera” in 1997 set the standard for the decades that followed, and Chelesvig agreed. When he first arrived, “we presented a few revivals that had wobbly sets and threads hanging from the costumes,” he recalled during an interview in his third-floor office, which looks north over downtown. “And I thought, ‘I’m never going to compromise on quality again.’”
With “Phantom” and every musical and play that followed, Chelesvig explained, “the quality of the show was exactly as it was in New York,” with the same creative team, costumes, sets and other elements.
“Quality is the best marketing tool,” he added. “That’s what has informed me more than anything else. You may not like a particular show, but I don’t think you could argue about the quality of the shows we present.”
TAKING CHANCES
Chelesvig’s unshakable faith in DMPA audiences is reflected in the risks he’s taken over the years, even as the state’s political climate has grown increasingly conservative. “What I’ve learned is you can build an audience by challenging them but then by also giving them joyful, fun shows like ‘Mamma Mia!’” he said.
“Rent” was the first show Chelesvig really took a chance on. Back then, in 1999, it was unusual for Broadway shows to feature a lot of adult themes, Chelesvig said. Since “Rent” deals with such subjects as AIDS, suicide and drug addiction, DMPA sent a letter to subscribers offering to exchange their tickets. “I think we had one person take us up on that,” Chelesvig recalled. In fact, all eight performances sold out. (Since then, “Rent” has returned for five more engagements.)
“The fact that we sold out the first engagement confirmed that the community was eager to see shows with serious themes that were important and meaningful,” he said. “I knew then that we had an audience that was ready to go on a journey with us, as long as we presented shows of very high quality.”
Other challenging shows have visited the Civic Center in the years since, including the Pulitzer-winning, 3-hour play “August: Osage County” and the musical “Spring Awakening,” which explores adolescent sexuality.
SPOTLIGHT ON IOWA
Inevitably, the question Chelesvig has dodged for many years comes up: What’s his favorite show? “There are shows I’m drawn to for a variety of reasons, like who I was with when I went to that performance or who I saw in the performance,” said Chelesvig, who estimates that he sees 50 to 60 shows a year, primarily in New York and London.
Still, when prodded, Chelesvig didn’t note a well-known blockbuster like “Hamilton” or any of the more challenging fare he’s brought to town. Instead, the answer reflects his deep Iowa roots: The 1995 pre-Broadway premiere of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “State Fair,” starring John Davidson and Kathryn Crosby, “was one of the most joyous nights of theater I’ve experienced,” Chelesvig said as he described the cheering audiences and the black-tie opening night that drew New York theater glitterati, the governor and other leaders. “It still gives me goosebumps thinking about it. I’ll never forget it.”
The other show “that will always have a very important part of my heart is Meredith Willson’s ‘The Music Man,’” he added, noting it will return to the Civic Center in March 2026. “I think it’s musical theater at its finest. It’s a great story … and the songs stick with you forever.”
MUSICAL INFLUENCE
Music has always been a central part of Chelesvig’s life. When he was growing up on a farm outside of Eagle Grove, his mother sang in the church choir and in the Choralaires in nearby Clarion. Chelesvig and his brother and sister also performed in choirs. Choral music “was the first arts thing I was exposed to, and especially in a rural town, those things can have a big impact,” Chelesvig said. “It did for me.”
In 1973, when he was in middle school, Chelesvig saw his first Broadway show, the musical “Applause,” at Stephens Auditorium in Ames. “I’d never seen anything like it,” he said. “It was a life-changing moment, and I just love that [DMPA does] that every day — that some kid who has never seen a live performance gets to have that experience and that it may change them for forever.”
ARTS EDUCATION
Throughout his career, Chelesvig’s childhood experiences have driven him to strengthen and expand DMPA’s donation-funded arts education and youth programming. In addition to school field trips, DMPA hosts summer theater camps, which have grown so much that DMPA is looking for additional space downtown to meet the expanded need.
Chelesvig is equally proud of the Iowa High School Musical Theater Awards. With more than 100 schools from across Iowa participating, it’s the nation’s largest program of its kind. “It’s one of my favorite things that we do,” Chelesvig said, a claim that’s easy to believe, considering he still travels statewide to serve as an adjudicator.
“I always say that it is way easier to vote for the Tony Awards than it is to adjudicate high school shows because I don’t have to give feedback to the Tony Awards,” he said with a laugh. “As I watch these kids on stage or behind the scenes, it takes me back to when I was in high school and got involved in theater, which led to where I am today.”
ACCESSIBLE APPROACH
Friends say Chelesvig’s willingness to adjudicate high school musicals reveals his unpretentious manner. “That’s just who he is,” Giovannetti said. “His ability to move among all different types of people is one of his strengths.”
Chelesvig, who manages a staff of 45 full-time and 361 part-time employees, said he tries to foster an open, accessible atmosphere at DMPA, something he learned when he was an Iowa State student working as a stagehand at Stephens Auditorium. “The full-time staff always treated the part-time staff really well and made us feel like we were part of a family,” he said. “That’s something that I’ve tried to continue here.”
Certainly, Chelesvig has faced some formidable challenges over the years, especially during the pandemic, when DMPA was forced to close its facilities for 18 months, lay off staff and cut salaries. Like many businesses, DMPA pivoted “to reimagine some things,” Chelesvig said. For example, DMPA created free outdoor programs in Cowles Commons and local parks that continue today.
At a personal level, he said, he longed to interact in person with audiences, patrons, staff and his industry colleagues in New York. “I learned that when you’re in this type of job,” he said, “you can’t take for granted how invigorating it is to work around so many creative people.”
Beyond the pandemic, his biggest personal challenge as DMPA’s president and CEO — “though one I don’t dwell on very much because if I did it would drive me crazy” — is that “it’s been hard to find my tribe in Des Moines because I feel like the business community thinks I’m an arts guy and the arts community thinks I’m a business person,” he said. “So I’m kind of an outsider to both of them, even though I’ve been both.”
Still, he credits community and business leaders, such as Giovannetti, Bill Knapp, Steve Zumbach, Jim Cownie and the late David Kruidenier, as being “gracious and helpful. They always took my calls. I’ll never forget that.”
THE NEXT CHAPTER
Evidence of Chelesvig’s eclectic interests and his journey as DMPA’s leader are everywhere in his office. On his credenza, framed letters from stars like Sean Connery sit alongside those from young students. Medallions from Tony Award-winning shows DMPA has invested in, such as “La Cage aux Folles” and “The Band’s Visit,” line up next to a photo of his siblings and a bottle of whiskey with a custom-made label honoring Chelesvig for his service in the Broadway League.
Framed photos and memorabilia from various events and milestones crowd his window ledge, while on his wall a poster that resembles the official one from “Dear Evan Hansen” instead says “Dear Jeff Chelesvig.” On another wall are original drawings by the late Frank Miller, the Pulitzer-winning editorial cartoonist for the Des Moines Register.
Soon, he’ll be packing it all up. Hitting his 30th anniversary “seemed like a good time to say, ‘I’m ready for the next chapter,’” he said. DMPA is “at a point where things are working really well, and I think it’s a good time for the organization to have some new leadership and a new vision.”
For his next chapter, he plans to read more. He loves mysteries set in England, like the Inspector Morse series by Colin Dexter, and is a big fan of Turner Classic Movies, especially the ones made by Alfred Hitchcock and Orson Welles. He enjoys the outdoors, particularly bicycling and hiking, and he still plans to make frequent trips to London, his “happy place,” and Salt Lake City, where his girlfriend lives. There’s a trip to Italy in the works, too.
Will Chelesvig miss being, as a friend of his once jokingly described him, “nearly famous”? Will he miss the excitement, the prestige, the joy that all come from his job?
Not really.
He said when he announced his retirement, “it felt like a burden had been lifted from my shoulders.”
“I’m at the point where I can savor the memories I have,” he added. “This is the right decision for me at this point in my life. It feels really good.”
“Hamilton.” Photo: Joan Marcus, 2024
BIGGEST HITS
Over the years, Des Moines Performing Arts has presented some of Broadway’s biggest blockbusters. Here are the top five:
Disney’s “The Lion King”
First visited in 2006. Its nearly six-week engagement remains DMPA’s longest run of a Broadway show. Since then, it’s returned three times.
Performances: 116
Attendance: 286,641
“The Phantom of the Opera”
Premiered in 1997 and has returned three times.
Performances: 112
Attendance: 235,225
“Wicked”
Premiered in 2009 and has returned three times. It will return in September 2026.
Performances: 80
Attendance: 183,077
“Les Miserables”
Premiered in 1989 and has returned eight times. It’s coming back in November.
Performances: 72
Attendance: 160,938
“Hamilton”
Premiered in 2018 and has returned twice.
Performances: 64
Attendance: 150,000*
*Including press-time estimates from June
“La Cage aux Folles”
TOUR KICK-OFFS
Five major Broadway productions have launched their national tours at the Des Moines Civic Center:
1995 “State Fair”
2001 “The Music Man”
2008 “Frost/Nixon”
2011 “La Cage aux Folles”
2015 “The Bridges of Madison County”
LONGEST RUN
“Triple Espresso” isn’t a Broadway productions, but its Des Moines premiere was DMPA’s overall longest engagement, running 68 weeks at the Temple Theater in 2002-2003.
“Triple Espresso”
ON THE NATIONAL STAGE
For the past three decades, Jeff Chelesvig has been leading theater not only in Iowa but across the country.
“Jeff is immensely respected in the industry,” said Albert Nocciolino, president of NAC Entertainment, which presents touring Broadway shows in eastern U.S. markets. “He has had a giant presence” on the national scene.
Nocciolino and Chelesvig have worked closely together in the Independent Presenters Network (IPN), a consortium of 40 leading Broadway presenters and performing arts centers. When DMPA joined, “Jeff understood that for all of us to succeed at the local level we had to participate at the national level,” Nocciolino said. “That’s where he took a seat at the table. Working together, we built extraordinary partnerships with Broadway producers.”
Chelesvig served a stint as IPN’s president and has helped it choose how to invest its member organizations’ money in Broadway productions. The first Broadway show DMPA invested in was “Thoroughly Modern Millie” in 2001, which went on to win six Tony Awards the following year. “Investing in shows put us on the map, and it changed the relationship we had with producers,” Chelesvig said.
DMPA typically invests $25,000 to $50,000 in the productions it supports. Investing “helped us to gain a position in the first year of a tour, which is really beneficial,” Chelesvig said. “Today, with our season ticket base, the size of our theater and the fact we’re in the center of the country, we get whatever shows we want.”
Other notable Broadway hits in which DMPA invested include “Kinky Boots,” “The Bridges of Madison County,” “Dear Evan Hansen” and “The Color Purple.” In 2024-2025, DMPA invested in “Life of Pi,” “Some Like it Hot” and the pop musical “& Juliet.” DMPA also invested in the 2024 Tony winner “The Outsiders,” which will play the Civic Center in February 2026.
Chelesvig noted that only about 10% of Broadway shows recoup their initial investment. (It was 20% before the pandemic.) Overall, DMPA has significantly beat those odds, recouping 70% of its investments — a stellar return. “I tell the board that this is our research and development expense,” Chelesvig said, adding that DMPA has a special fund that’s dedicated to this purpose.
In addition to IPN, Chelesvig also has been involved in the Broadway League, the industry’s trade association, which honored him in May with its Distinguished Lifetime Service Award. He has served on the organization’s board of governors and is Iowa’s only Tony Awards voter. As a lifetime member, he’ll remain a Tony voter even after he retires.
Whether organizing a committee, participating in conferences or serving on an industry task force, Chelesvig “is not afraid to roll up his sleeves,” Nocciolino said. “The work is never about Jeff. It’s about how that work will benefit all of us.”
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