Editors Annie Smith and Amy Strilchuk met with Robert Gardiner, Head of the Department of Theatre, Film and Creative Writing at UBC, and Norman Armour, the Artistic Producer of Rumble Theatre Productions, to discuss the impetus and goals for this theatre venture. We present excerpts from our conversation:

Smith: There are a number of international companies performing particularly in Europe. How does the international co-production of K. relate to this phenomenon?

Armour: In the case of K.: a few years ago, the Canada Council created a pilot program. I traveled to Copenhagen, three years ago in the summertime, with a number of other Canadian producers and attended an international theatre festival over that summer and was introduced to a number of producers, one of them being Kaleidoskop. It was out of those initial conversations that the idea of co-production got going.

Gardiner: It’s of course traditional to do international presenting but co-creation starts to build on the strength and abilities of one cultural centre relative to another cultural centre and you get something very interesting coming out of that dialogue. That's what I think the Canada Council Program and what Norman and I were thinking about and talking about.

Strilchuk: Is this production part of Canadian theatre practice, which embraces our many cultures, or is this “International Theatre” in Canada?

Gardiner: From the educational point of view, and I think from the artistic point of view, we actually see it as part of Canadian theatre practice in that there are things to be learned from this production for us as Canadian theatre artists and Canadian theatre-artists-in-training. There is also, perhaps more importantly, the initiation of dialogue. I think that that's the assumption in the Canada Council program. It's certainly our assumption as a university. This opens a channel of communication. There are hundreds and hundreds of potential channels that can be opened all over the world.

Armour: K. is part of the PuSh International Performance series which presents Canadian and internationally acclaimed or renowned work. Bringing in work from other cultures opens up the possibilities for local artists but also for audiences – to perhaps look with fresher eyes at their own local neighbourhood. Work from elsewhere is a window on the world; it allows us to reflect back on ourselves in perhaps new or more appreciative ways. Vancouver has gone through extraordinary demographic and cultural changes but remains, unfortunately, quite isolated.

Smith: Why produce K. here? - a play about a Czech writer, writing in German, written and produced first in Denmark, translated into English and performed on the west coast of Canada. How will the students at UBC, both actors and audience, benefit from this venture?

Gardiner: Kafka is a writer who is intellectually significant to the world in which we live and how we understand it. He was living in the Austro-Hungarian Empire which was, if anything, the multicultural ancestor of all. They couldn't even have a single language in their government because not everybody could speak one language. K. has a lot to say to a multicultural universe. It's really interesting; it's good theatre.

Armour: The idea of interacting and collaborating – coproducing with an institution like UBC with such an illustrious, long career and a real impact and involvement with the development of professional theatre in this city – in an extraordinary theatre, a beautiful, beautiful theatre – allows students to work alongside and inside a production where they will rub shoulders with four fantastic Vancouver based professional actors and a prize-winning Danish designer, director and playwright at the peak of his career.

Gardiner: The international aspect of this is fortuitous. When I am looking for co-productions, internationalism is not the only criterion that I am looking for. From the point of view of the University and of the city, I think that the international component here is an extremely important one: culturally, politically, and for all the reasons we have been saying. This came together at the right point at the right time the way good things do.