Ian Brown does not indulge in such practice. The artistic director of the West Yorkshire Playhouse, in Leeds, is too busy – as well as directing shows he has a building to run.

Even today, with the theatre "dark" for the summer with no shows being performed, there are so many people around that were Brown to stop each moment he passed someone, he would never have time to do any actual work.

He does, however, offer a friendly hello to anyone he passes, a small detail in a larger picture which has seen Brown turn the Playhouse into one of the most welcoming theatres in the country, a fact borne out by the year-on-year rise of audience figures since his arrival, and countless testimonies from actors and directors.

While officially closed for the summer, the venue remains a hive of activity, so much so that it takes around 20 minutes for Brown to find a quiet spot to conduct our interview.

First, we are moved on from a corner of the café which is receiving its annual maintenance and the seats we have pulled up to a table need to be cleaned ahead of the re-opening of the theatre, at the beginning of September.

Next, we move into another part of the building where the café has been relocated while the maintenance is carried out, but it is full of directors and actors meeting to discuss projects.

Moving into the Quarry, the main theatre of the Playhouse, there is even less luck – it is full of technicians playing music and banging away at bits of the stage.

Eventually, we find a spot outside the main rehearsal room, deep behind the labyrinthine corridors of the theatre.

"When we're dark, people don't realise just how busy the building still is," says Brown, before stopping to say hello to the actor taking on the title role in Don Quixote the Playhouse new season's big show.

When the theatre season is in full swing, Brown has seen to it that the building is not just busy, but heaving.

A former schoolteacher, he began his directing career with a company called Tag, before moving on to become artistic director of Glasgow's Traverse theatre, where he oversaw the first ever production of Trainspotting.

Five years ago, he took on one of the most important jobs in regional theatre succeeding the pr wizard and artistic whirlwind that is Jude Kelly.

When she was at the Playhouse, there was no mistaking who was in charge and she created some lasting and impressive productions, perhaps most notably Singin' in the Rain.

Brown has trodden a different path, democratising the Playhouse for the people who visit and work in it.

His approach has clearly paid dividends; last month, he signed a contract with the theatre's board extending his five-year-long tenure for another half-decade, a testament in part to a 12 per cent year-on-year increase in audiences in 2006.

"When I arrived, I wanted to change certain things about the Playhouse, but above all else I wanted to keep the audience coming into the building," says Brown.

This aim has been achieved, not by playing to the gallery, but with the venue staging some unexpected productions. Out went the blockbusting, musicals of Kelly's reign and in came quirkier, more challenging theatre and plays which were distinctly left-field – Bad Girls the Musical sharing a venue with Cornwall-based Kneehigh Theatre, which found an audience in Yorkshire long before it charmed London crowds at the National.

"I wanted to make the Playhouse more specific and more attached to the area."

"While I wanted the audience to increase, I never believed there was such a thing as the audience," says Brown.

"There is no one group of people who always come to the Playhouse to see everything, and why would we possibly want that to be the case?

"People now come to see things intermittently. They might be tempted to see one thing, but never want to bother with another part of our programming, and that is a real strength. Our audiences for new writing are fantastic, but many of those people wouldn't want to see, say, our big Christmas show, but providing both of those things means that our audience is constantly renewable."

Such programming is bold but handing the stages of a premier theatre over to plays as strange and experimental as Bat Boy The Musical has left Brown open to critical jibes.

"It's very easy, if you have a steady audience coming through the door, to fall into a pattern of doing the same thing.

"As well as being an artistic director, I am chief executive of the theatre, so I have to make sure that the books balance. This is a way to make that happens and make sure the people in the building are creatively fulfilled."

When he took over the Playhouse, Brown reveals that the theatre was £235,000 in the red. With annual funding of £1m, compared to the National Theatre's £12m, each year Brown has streamlined his budget to make this money back, which it has now done.

Does this mean the next five years will see the spendthrift turn fool with his money and start to stage lavish shows?

"The last five years have been very challenging, and I don't mean within the theatre, but within the world at large – everything has changed," says Brown. "When I arrived, it was shortly after the terrorist attacks on New York and the world changed overnight, and it remains a changed place today.

"People became anxious and insular. The theatre is an important place to reflect the things that are going on, but for me it is also a place where people who are completely different to each other can congregate and sit cheek-by-jowl to experience something together.

"I want our programming to keep reflecting that and to keep a disparate and increasing audience coming through the doors."

And, while he won't have time to personally shake the hand of everyone who does, Brown's busy building will be sure to give them a warm welcome.


Iann Brown

1969-1972: Trained at the Central School of Speech and Drama.

1972-1974: Drama and English teacher, Cliffold Park. Comprehensive, Stoke Newington

1974-1984: Freelance director, with work at RSC, BBC, two years as associate director at Theatre Royal Stratford East, director of Cockpit Youth Theatre, visiting lecturer at Rose Buford Academy, RADA, Central School of Speech and Drama and the Webber Douglas Academy.

1984-1988: Artistic Director, Tag Theatre company, Glasgow.

1988-1996: Artistic Director, Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh.

1996-2002: Freelance director with work including RSC, Bush Theatre, London, BBC, West Yorkshire Playhouse.

2002: Made Artistic Director, West Yorkshire Playhouse.