\Sirk wrote a picnic for Imitation of Life as a happy time away from a hectic work schedule. Needing a break, Lora Meredith collects her daughter Susie and her African American housekeeper Annie Johnson and calls her sometime lover Steve Archer, “Listen. . . I have this Sunday off. . . the first Sunday I’ve had in weeks, and we’re going to drive into the country for a picnic.” However, it’s not what it seems.
Contrary to expectation, Sirk’s picnic gets edgy, just enough to set it on edge to suggest that Lora is a careless mother to her adolescent daughter Susie. Annie’s rebellious draught Sarah jane gets off by pretending to be feverish. Annie is perturbed because Sarah Jane is trying to pass for White. Lora is also oblivious to this conflict.
Lora is too self-absorbed to recognize wandering off with Steve will be a downer for Susie. She’s only interested in rekindling romance. “You know I still have you in my blood, don’t you?” says Steve. “Oh, Steve,” says Lora, “do you really.” 
While Mom is engaged in romance, Susie sits with Annie. Thinking out loud, her constant references to Steve indicate that she has a crush on him, foretelling considerable trouble beyond the picnic. For now, Susie is left alone with Annie Johnson, their family’s African American housekeeper, who is a kind of mother to her. About adult behavior. Annie says, “Now, there’s a kind of kissin’ that that’s not careless and doesn’t lead to harm . . . when the two people kissin’ are nice and right. Kissin’ is part of failing love, and the Lord wants his children to fall in love. . . when they’re old enough and got sense enough.”
To viewers, this seems like a pleasant picnic. Wickes have been emptied on the grass. Thermoses, a large stainless steel soup pot, and all kinds of foods, dishes, and flatware are evident and unused. A camp grill is heating, but no one is grilling. When Sarah Jane wants to find Steve, Annie tells her to sit and wait, “Now you let them alone. Maybe they got things to talk about.” When they do return, the scene fades, and we never get to see the steaks grilling.
* Sirk’s Imitation of Life is a very loose adaptation of John Stahl’s 1939 film that is based on Fanny Hurst’s novel Imitation of Life, neither of which includes a picnic
The cast: Lana Turner as Lora Meredith; Juanita Moore as Annie Johnson; Sandra dee as Susie Meredith; Susan Kohner as Sarah Jane Johnson; John Gavin as Steve Archer
See Douglas Sirk. Imitation of Life (1959). Screenplay by Eleanore Griffin and Allan Scott based on Fanny Hurst’s novel (1934); Fanny Hurst. Imitation of Life. New York: Harper & Brother, 1933; Lucy Fischer, editor. Imitation of Life, Douglas Sirk, Director. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1991.