When Hal Carter tells Madge Owens, “We’re not goin’ on no goddamn picnic,” he means they are “goin'” to make love instead. Madge is willing. They are so passionate, their lust so potent, audiences never notice that when the curtain falls, there is no picnic. Audiences love it not because of what they miss seeing but because of what they imagine happening.
Madge Owen (Janice Rule) and Hal Carter (Ralph Meeker) are about to embrace and kiss.
Inge’s dialogue for the 1953 seduction scene is brusque. Madge coyly makes a play for Hal, and then when Hal’s sensuality and physical presence are too much for her. Hesitantly and willingly, she gives in:
Hal: Baby!
Madge: I . . . I get so tired of being told I’m pretty.
Hal: (Folding her in his arms caressingly) Baby, baby.
Madge: (Resisting him, jumping to her feet) Don’t. We have to go. We have all the baskets in our car, and they’ll be waiting. (Hal gets up and walks slowly to her, their eyes fastened and Madge feeling a little thrill of excitement as he draws nearer) Really – we have to be going. (Hal takes her in his arms and kisses her passionately. Then Madge utters his name in a voice of resignation) Hal!
Hal: Just be quiet, baby.
Madge: Really . . . We have to go. They’ll be waiting.
Hal: (Picking her up in his arms and starting off. His voice is deep and firm) We’re not goin’ on no goddamn picnic.
Madge’s three-dozen bread-and-butter sandwiches get trashed.
Few remember that Inge revised Picnic. Privately, he had long nursed deep regrets about Joshua Logan’s revisions to the stage script and Daniel Taradash’s screenplay (1955). Because there isn’t a picnic in Inge’s play, nor ever would be in his play, he retitled it Summer Brave: A Romance in Three Acts (1962) and reaffirmed Madge’s emerging womanhood. Inge revised the seduction scene at the end of Act 2.
Under Logan’s direction, the dialog is brusque and steamy, but in Inge’s revision, it’s wooden. When Hal swaggers, Madge suggests he has an inferiority complex and giggles. Hal’s animal physicality is still evident, but he’s crude. When he makes a pass at Madge, it’s impulsive, not seductive.
Madge: (to Hal). You know what? I think you have an inferiority complex.
Hal. Quiet, doll.
Madge. (Gives a little giggle.) No one ever called me “doll” before.
Hal. Yah?
Madge. Honest!
Hal. Well . . . there’s a first time for everything.
Madge. We better go.
Hal. Come here, doll!
Madge. We’ve got the basket with fried chicken.
Hal. (Appraising her from head to toe.) Haven’t we just!
Madge. They’ll be waiting.
Hal. Look, baby. I got a hot news flash.
Madge. What?
Hal. (Suddenly and impulsively, he takes her in his arms and kisses her devouringly.) We’re not goin’ on no Goddamn picnic.
The final line is still a corker. Inge got that right, again. In a preface to Summer Brave, Inge enigmatically refers to the play as a romantic comedy. But this seduction is neither romantic nor comedic.
*Importantly, Inge changed the Summer Brave ending: Madge does not go after Hal. She remains home to face an uncertain future. Leaving for work the morning after Hal’s departure, she tells her mother, “I’m perfectly capable of making up my own mind, thank you.” Madge is a changed woman. Making love with Hal has provided her with a new sense of self, and she accepts the responsibilities of her actions and being beautiful (always a chore).
Featured image: Joshua Logan’s setting for the 1953 Broadway production. Hal Carter (Ralph Meeker) are Madge Owens (Janice Rule), Alan Seymour (Paul Newman), Rosemary Sydney (Eileen Heckart), Howard Bevans (Arthur O’Connell), Flo Owens (Peggy Conklin). Inge was awarded the 1953 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Also, Joshua Logan’s Picnic 1955.
See William Inge. Picnic; a Summer Romance in Three Acts. New York: Random House, 1953; Summer Brave: The Rewritten and Final Version of the Romantic Comedy Picnic. New York: Dramatists Play Service, 1983; Joshua Logan. Picnic (1955). Daniel Taradash is based on William Inge’s play (1953); Ralph Voss. A Life of William Inge. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1989.