'Semtex Boyd' is given the chance to shake up the RSC

Michael Boyd, the director who suggested putting Semtex under the Royal Shakespeare Company to shake it up, was handed the ammunition yesterday when he was appointed its new head.

Boyd, the frontrunner and staff favourite to succeed Adrian Noble, said he wanted to encourage the return of past stars such as Alan Rickman, Lindsay Duncan and Vanessa Redgrave.

He also committed himself to develop new talent with more rehearsal time and better training for a core ensemble of actors.

Boyd, 47, backed Noble's controversial decision to quit its long-time London home at the Barbican for a vagrant life in venues around the capital, a –decision which has produced a drop in attendance.

"It would have been impossible to really and radically move forward without breaking the mould at a crucial and difficult time."

But he remained silent on the one question which everyone wanted him to answer – whether or not he would press ahead with his predecessor's inflammatory proposal to demolish the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon, a listed building.

"I didn't get the job because of anything I said about Stratford or London. My homework in the weeks before talking to the great and good about this job was about the work," he said.

"Of course, I have views about buildings, the environment, whatever, but my feet didn't even get under the table until yesterday. I'm not going to air these views just now."

However, he said it would be healthy for the RSC to have a regular home in London in the long-run, although that did not mean the company would be resident all year.

Boyd, who is married with three children, was born in Belfast and studied English at Edinburgh University before training in Moscow, Coventry and Sheffield.

He was the founding artistic director of the well-regarded Tron Theatre in Glasgow from 1985 to 1989 and first worked for the RSC eight years ago. He became associate director in 1996 and won an Olivier Award for his Henry VI trilogy, the RSC's first production to star a black king.

He said he wanted to create an RSC of "vision and passion" presenting both the classics and new writing.

"The future is going to be bright if we inspire the best artists to feel we are their preferred place to do their most challenging work and that we are the best place for them to come and grow as artists," he said.

Such bland statements of intent belie his radicalism, his supporters claim.

Michael Attenborough, who left the RSC recently to run the Almeida Theatre in London, said Boyd was a "highly creative subversive" who was no great lover of tradition.

"Michael takes absolutely nothing for granted. He takes a delight in re-examining everything from the grass roots upwards. He will be absolutely rigorous with the work and create circumstances that enable actors and directors to be as thorough and creative as possible too."

Stephen Daldry, who first worked with Boyd 20 years ago at the Sheffield Crucible, said: "He has done consistently extraordinary work. But organisationally the RSC needs an imaginative managerial genius as well as an imaginative directorial talent. My firm belief is that Michael can do both."

He added: "If you look back to his days at the Tron, you can see a real care about the writers and the artists. He created a theatre there against huge obstacles with great spirit and élan."

However, Attenborough echoed the voices of many in warning of the size of the task ahead. "He's going to have a lot of healing to do. A lot of people in the RSC are muddled and confused and bruised and there are massive financial difficulties [as a result of the recent changes]. He will have to be very clear and strong. But he's more than capable of doing that."

Lord Alexander of Weedon, the RSC's chairman, said the company had conducted a "rigorous and exhaustive" search for a successor to Adrian Noble, who quit suddenly in the face of the fierce criticism over his plans. Boyd's closest rival for the job was thought to be fellow associate director Gregory Doran, the partner of the actor Sir Antony Sher.