The film dramatizes 24 hours in the life of a small Kansas town in the mid-20th century during the Labor Day holiday. It is the story of an outsider whose appearance disrupts and rearranges the lives of those whom he encounters.
Plot
On the morning of Labor Day 1955, a freight train brings vagrant Hal Carter to a Kansas town to visit his fraternity friend Alan Benson. While he stays with kind Helen Potts, he also meets Alan's girlfriend Madge Owens, her sister Millie, and their mother. Alan is happy to see the "same old Hal" and shows him his family's sprawling grain-elevator operations. He promises Hal a steady job as a "wheat scooper" and invites him to attend the town's Labor Day picnic.
At the picnic, Hal divides his attention among Madge, Millie, and middle-aged schoolteacher Rosemary, who is accompanied by her gentleman friend Howard Bevens. After Hal dances with Madge, an intoxicated Rosemary accosts him, tearing his shirt and causing a scene. Alan unjustly blames him and says he is embarrassed that he invited him. By now a crowd is watching, and Hal flees into the darkness.
Madge follows Hal to Alan's car and gets in with him. By the river, he tells her he was sent to reform school as a boy for stealing a motorcycle and that his whole life is a failure. They kiss. Outside Madge's house, they promise to meet after she finishes work the next evening.
Hal drives back to Alan's house to return the car, but Alan has called the police and wants him arrested. Hal flees the house in the car with the police following close behind. He shows up at Howard's apartment, asking to spend the night there. Howard is very understanding and now has his own worries: Rosemary has begged him to marry her. Back at the Owens house, Madge and Millie cry themselves to sleep in their shared room.
The next morning, Howard comes to the Owens house, intending to tell Rosemary he wants to wait, but at the sight of him she is overjoyed, thinking he has come to take her away. He wordlessly goes along with the misunderstanding. As Howard passes Madge on the stairs, he tells her Hal is hiding in the back seat of his car. Hal is able to slip away before the other women gleefully decorate Howard's car.
While Howard and Rosemary happily drive off to the Ozarks, Hal and Madge meet by a shed behind the house. He tells her that he loves her and asks her to meet him in Tulsa, where they can marry and he can get a job at a hotel as a bellhop and elevator operator. Mrs. Owens finds them by the shed and threatens to call the police. Madge and Hal embrace and kiss.
Hal runs to catch a passing freight train, crying out to Madge, "You love me! You love me!" Upstairs in their room, Millie tells Madge to "do something bright" for once in her life and go to Hal. Madge packs a small suitcase and, despite her mother's tears, boards a bus for Tulsa.
Columbia acquired the rights to the play for $350,000 in September 1953.[6]
Harry Cohn offered the job of directing to Joshua Logan, who had directed the stage version. Logan was grateful as he had just had a manic breakdown. He says Cohn suggested Logan cast Kim Novak but did not insist on it; the director felt Novak was very close to the character she played. Janice Rule, who played the part on Broadway, did a screen test but Logan said it went poorly. Writer Daniel Taradash pushed for Carroll Baker and who tested but Logan felt she was too young. Novak screen tested twice and was given the part. William Holden was already cast when Logan came on board. Kim Stanley played the youngster sister on stage but Logan thought she was too old on film and cast Susan Strasberg. Eileen Heckert played the school teacher on Broadway but Harry Cohn wanted a bigger name so Rosalind Russell was cast. Paul Newman was under contract to Warner Bros and was unable to reprise his role as Alan so Logan cast Cliff Robertson who had been in a touring company of Mister Roberts.[7]
When Picnic was cast, William Holden was already 37—too old according to some to play the role of Hal Carter.[citation needed] Regardless, Holden was "happy to finish his Columbia Picturescontract with such a prestigious project" despite the film paying him $30,000 instead of the $250,000 he would have otherwise earned.[5]Picnic was one of Kim Novak's early film roles, and this movie made her a star. In the film, Holden keeps his hair combed in an untidy fringe over his forehead and has the sleeves of his shirt rolled up throughout. He shaved his chest for the shirtless shots and was reportedly nervous about his dancing for the "Moonglow" scene. Logan took him to Kansas roadhouses where he practiced steps in front of jukeboxes with choreographer Miriam Nelson. Heavy thunderstorms with tornado warnings repeatedly interrupted shooting of the scene on location, and it was completed on a backlot in Burbank, where Holden (according to some sources)[specify] was "dead drunk" to calm his nerves.
Millie, the independently minded girl who memorizes Shakespeare sonnets and rebels against her older sister, was an early role for Susan Strasberg, the daughter of prominent Method drama teacher Lee Strasberg. Elizabeth Wilson had a bit part as one of the smirking schoolteachers. Verna Felton, a longtime radio and TV character actor who was well-known to audiences in the 1950s, had a strong supporting role as neighbor Helen Potts. Bomber, the paperboy, was played by Nick Adams, an actor who dated Natalie Wood and was a friend of both James Dean and Elvis Presley. Mr. Benson was played by Raymond Bailey (without his toupee), later known on television as Beverly Hillbillies banker Milburn Drysdale. Reta Shaw, Elizabeth Wilson, and Arthur O'Connell recreated their roles from the original Broadway production.[8] This was Rosalind Russell's first Hollywood movie after a big success on Broadway with her Tony Award-winning performance in Wonderful Town (1953).
During filming of the actual picnic scenes in Halstead, Kansas, a tornado swept through the area, forcing the cast and crew to take cover. While the storm spared the set, it devastated the nearby town of Udall, Kansas, and the film crew drove their trucks and equipment there to help clean up the damage.[9]: 10
Locations
The extensive use of Kansas locations highlighted the naturalistic, small-town drama. Picnic was shot mostly around Hutchinson, Kansas.[5] Other Kansas locations include:
Halstead's Riverside Park is where the Labor Day picnic scenes were filmed.[10][11][9]: 10 The park and many landmarks remained at the time of the movie's 50th anniversary. The merry-go-round and cable suspension footbridge, which spans the Little Arkansas River, are still located there.
Nickerson is the location of the two adjacent houses used for the Owens family home and that of Mrs. Potts. It is where Hal (William Holden) "jumps a freight" to go to Tulsa and where Madge boards a bus in the last scene.[9]: 11
Salina, for the opening scene where Hal jumps off a train, then meets Alan (Cliff Robertson) at Alan's father's large house. This location is also used for the Saline River (where Madge kisses Hal) and the scene where Hal escapes from the police by running under a waterfall.[9]: 8–9
Sterling, where the pre-picnic swim in the lake was filmed.[9]: 11
In a contemporary review, critic Mae Tinee of the Chicago Tribune wrote:
It is a taut two hours of masterful movie making ... The story presents a cross-section of many lives, but the telling is never hurried, the detail is impressive, and the performances are some of the finest of the year. ... The film tells a moving and human tale, and does it in superb fashion. It is one of the finest examples of superior motion picture production."[15]
[I]t should be noted that William Inge's distinguished comedy-drama is slightly travelworn here and there. The hearts and minds of the commonplace Kansas townsfolk that were so beautifully revealed on stage still leave a sharp, poignant and lasting impression on a moviegoer. But the new CinemaScope surroundings appear too vast an occasion for these basically intimate stories. Lebensraum apparently is not what these Plains people need. And, while the titular picnic of this sprawling dramatization is inventive, eye-catching and eye-filling, it is not particularly germane to the dramas at hand. ... In returning to film making after a long absence, Joshua Logan, who has lived with the play from the beginning, has made its characters come alive again through his directorial artistry. Although he is occasionally overwhelmed by the CinemaScope process, Mr. Inge's principals are not. They still make 'Picnic' a memorable and moving drama.[16]
The film was restored in the mid-1990s[17] and brought many art-house bookings.[18]
"Moonglow and Theme from 'Picnic'" by Morris Stoloff and the Columbia Pictures Orchestra reached #1 on the Billboard Top 100 and remained on the chart for 27 weeks.
"Moonglow and Theme from 'Picnic'" by George Cates and His Orchestra reached #4 on the Billboard Top 100 and remained on the chart for 22 weeks.
"Picnic", a vocal version by the McGuire Sisters, reached #13 on the Billboard Top 100 and remained on the chart for 20 weeks. The single was a double A-side with "Delilah Jones", a #37 hit.
At one point, the three singles were in the Top 40 simultaneously, and the Stoloff and Cates versions ranked consecutively at #3 and #4 in the Top 100 chart of June 2, 1956.
The soundtrack album reached #2 on the Billboard album chart, where it remained for 56 weeks beginning in February 1956.[21]
Subliminal marketing hoax
In 1957, marketing researcher James Vicary said he had included subliminal messages such as "eat popcorn" and "drink Coca-Cola" in public screenings of Picnic for six weeks, claiming sales of Coca-Cola and popcorn increased 18.1% and 57.8% respectively. However, after being unable to replicate the results, Vicary later admitted that he had falsified the data.[22]
^ abcdeShaffer, Bill (Spring 2005). "The Summer of Picnic"(PDF). Kansas Heritage. 13 (1). Archived(PDF) from the original on 2022-10-10. Retrieved 14 September 2016.
^"Picnic". SwapaDVD.com. 2007. Archived from the original on 2007-12-12. Retrieved 2014-02-15. The DVD greatly benefits from a mid-1990s film restoration project that saw Picnic back on the big screen in art houses across the country.
