take rimbaud

by Susanna Fournier

A Howland Company Production in Partnership with Buddies

May 6 – 23, 2026
$10 / $25 / $45 / $75
all prices + fees

Toronto, 2014 / Paris, 1871 / hell, always

This is why I quit art.

Four poets, a sloppy love triangle, an unfinished art film, and an electric oven. Can we still talk about the apocalypse as if it hasn’t already happened? It’s 2014 in Toronto (hell) and 1871 in France (also hell). The poets torture themselves to make work that means something rightnow, but time feels slippery and no narrative can keep them safe. Nevertheless! Sappho’s brand manager has suggestions for her website, and queerness is really marketable right now. Especially if the queers in question are already dead. 

A performance poem traversing the worlds of Arthur Rimbaud, Paul Verlaine, Sylvia Plath, Sappho, and post-art school malaise, take rimbaud flirts with creation, revolution, and violence at the end of the world. 

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Content/Sensory Warning:

Mature themes and language, haze, strobe and flashing lights, use of a prop weapon, suicide, substance abuse, gunshot and loud sounds, partial nudity, honey nut Cheerios with “natural almond flavour” eaten on stage.

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Susanna Fournier // playwright
ted witzel // director

Featuring:

Thomas Mitchell Barnet // Julian De Zotti // Ruth Goodwin // Rose Tuong// Breton Lalama // Hallie Seline // Courtney Ch’ng Lancaster// Cameron Laurie // 

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Preview
May 6 // 7:30PM

Show Run
May 6 – 23
Wed – Fri // 7:30PM
Sat // 2PM + 7:30PM

Mask Mandatory Performance
Saturday, May 16 (2PM)

Run Time: 1hr 45min

About The Howland Company
The Howland Company is one of Toronto’s leading independent theatre companies that strives for innovation on and off stage. Artist-led and art-driven, Howland is dedicated to the production of electric stories that speak to the world and the times in which we live. The Howland Company seeks to challenge and inspire audiences through productions, training, and community initiatives like The Reading Group, fostering a new wave of theatre makers and theatre-goers.