At age 37, William Holden was too old to play Hal Carter, a youngish drifter, in Joshua Logan‘s film adaptation of William Inge‘s Picnic. A few weeks after Picnic opened on 12.7.55, Holden appeared on the cover of Time — a semi-official proclamation that he was peaking as a big-time movie star. Except the painting of Holden that Time used made him appear no younger than 45, which was really too old to play a guy who hadn’t yet figured out what to do with his life.
Holden and his Picnic costar Kim Novak had relatively short runs as super-duper movie stars slash sex symbols. Holden’s began with his breakout role in Sunset Boulevard (’50) and ended with his costarring role in The Horse Soldiers (’59). (He kept working until his death on 11.12.81, but the shining glory era lasted only a decade.) Novak’s Picnic performance made her a star, but her peak period lasted only until her lead role in Of Human Bondage (’64).
