Hugh Hefner’s House of HORRORS: Playboy’s Dark Legacy

Is there anything do you ever think of that you're at least in the position where there's almost nothing you can't have and ever feel frustrated by that? >> No. >> Did that come across as a bad question? >> No. >> I mean if if you could have if you could make a wish if Hefner could have his wish for something he doesn't have, do you have any idea what it would be? It wouldn't be related to me personally. I think it would be a you know, a better society probably for all of us to live in. >> What defines femininity, sexuality in the public eye? Well, for decades it's been men. >> [music] >> My name is Hugh Hefner. I'm 35 years of age and I'm editor publisher of Playboy magazine. In 8 years I've built an empire worth 20 million. >> Men have decided the beauty standard for women, what's appropriate for women to wear, how they should be sexy and feminine and fit. >> There were a lot of platinum blondes in the movies in the 1930s and since my marriage all my girlfriends have looked like they stepped right out of a Busby Berkeley musical. >> Someone would say most of the playmates in the magazine have looked >> I could be accused of that, yes. We do seem to lean in the direction of blondes. >> How they should look, act, what they should say, when they should speak and when they should fade into the background. >> [music] >> Well there. Glad you could join us this evening. I'm Hugh Hefner, editor publisher of Playboy magazine and your host. >> Men have always decided such things. But within this ambiguous concept of men dominating over the beauty standard, there has been one victor who presided over women dictating what is and isn't sexy and distributing this information to the rest of the men of the world as he kept tight control on the industry and tight control over his circle of women. And that man is Hugh Hefner. >> Welcome to the Playboy Mansion. I just can't turn this down and go back to work on Monday. >> Mystery illness [music] that may have sickened guests at the Playboy Mansion. >> childhood fantasy till it [music] all came crashing down. >> In the little more than 20 years since the Playboy bunny became an artifact of American culture, he's parlayed his magazine into a far-flung [music] enterprise that now includes two magazines, more than 15 nightclubs, a series of resort hotels, books, records, occasional motion picture productions, [music] and several theaters. And with it all has come a steady assault [music] on the Puritan ethic. >> But the crown wears heavy, and in order to stay in power and keep his control, Hugh Hefner stooped lower and lower into depravity never seen or heard of before, until the most recent news in circulation, that is. It seems like nowadays men in power are constantly utilizing a circle of vulnerable women to control a circle of powerful men as they blackmail and manipulate everyone around them to climb the ladder of success while everyone slides further and further into the pits of hell. >> Gigantic names. My next guest has created an empire. In fact, the London Times said they always refer to Hefner as one of the great empire builders, and they said that he is as well known a symbol of American life as Coca-Cola. >> Hugh Hefner is the epitome of this now unfortunate archetype, and maybe many things can be gleaned from his story. How one strives for power and control, believing themselves to be the victor when in reality they are the villain. >> Hefner died of natural causes >> [music] >> surrounded by family. >> Let me tell you the story of a pathetic truly one of the most pathetic men in history. >> Hugh Hefner must be rolling in his grave right now. >> widow [music] is speaking out. >> 10,000 women passed through its doors. >> Being in a prison. >> Former girlfriends describe him as a vampire who sucked the life [music] out of young girls. >> In a way I felt sorry for him. It was partly Stockholm Syndrome. >> She compares her decade-long stay at the mansion to being in a cult. >> [music] [music] >> Hugh Hefner became known as, well, the ultimate playboy who founded Playboy magazine, rich and living a life surrounded by women. But before this happened, he was an awkward kid who lived a quiet life during a very conservative era. >> You say that you've been poor and you've been rich and rich is better. Did you grow up >> My folks were farm people, came from Nebraska. My father They're both still living. My father's an accountant. Uh but I was raised during the depression. >> [music] >> And we never wanted for anything. But we were not wealthy, you know, middle class. >> Hugh Marston Hefner had a strict upbringing. Born in Chicago, Illinois to devout Methodist parents, [music] Hefner's household was described as conservative and emotionally reserved with little to no discussion of sex or physical affection. Our family was prohibitionist, Puritan in a very real sense. Never smoked, swore, drank, [music] danced, or hugged. There was absolutely no hugging or kissing in my family, Hefner recalled. You wonder how growing up starved for love and affection would affect someone. There was a point in time when my mother, later in my life, apologized to me for [music] not being able to show affection, Hefner recalled. That was, of course, the way she was raised. I said to her, "Mom, you couldn't have done it any better." And because of the things you were able to do, it set me on a course that changed my life and the world. Hugh Hefner believed he changed the world and that his [music] childhood lack of love set him up for his destiny in doing so. Why would a childhood of no love bring about someone like Hugh Hefner, who creates Playboy magazine, a magazine [music] showcasing women's bodies with notably still a complete lack of emotional connection? >> Came from a strong Methodist rather almost fundamentalist Methodist background. A lot of that idealism stuck, but a lot of the the trappings [music] didn't. >> As a child, Hugh liked to write and draw from an early age. At 9 years old, Hugh created and sold a small neighborhood newspaper for a penny per copy. This reminds me of every single successful businessman interview, where they always seem to say, "I was an entrepreneur from an early age." And then being an entrepreneur from an early age was like selling Girl Scout cookies. >> Leave a message. Beep. >> Hefner also spent time drawing cartoons and reading magazines, including Esquire. Which, isn't that a fairly adult magazine for a child to be reading, especially one with such a strict upbringing? Hugh Hefner was said to have a high intelligence, but [music] had his head in the clouds. His tendency to daydream made him fall behind on schoolwork. >> You were described as a rather shy, introverted adolescent. >> There was a period in which I withdrew. And that's when I was quite young. What I withdrew into was a lot of my own dreams and fantasies, and that's what led me to to writing. >> His mother took him to a psychologist who tested his IQ, maybe believing he had intelligence issues. But allegedly, it was the opposite. Hefner supposedly had an IQ of 152, if you take IQ tests seriously, which was far above the average. But Hugh Hefner was very emotionally immature, which I think is something often undervalued. You can be someone who's seen to have a high IQ, but still have a low emotional intelligence. And because of that, you can do things that are very damaging to others. There are many people in society currently who are seen as geniuses [music] or valued for their work, when I would argue they have a very low emotional intelligence. And because of that, produce damaging outcomes. Their effect on the world and overall net negative. >> What about girls when you were young? >> I used to be very interested in animals [music] when I was when I was a kid and then I discovered girls and kind of lost interest in the animals and really moved, I think into a more extroverted outgoing personality in the last two years of high school. >> Hugh Hefner's low emotional intelligence showed through the most when he handled heartbreak. And heartbreak came about early on in his life. In his junior year of high school, a girl named Betty Conklin rejected him. And Hugh Hefner seemingly couldn't handle it. So, Hugh reinvented himself. >> And at home, they created a rigid moral environment that Hefner found stifling. An early rejection from a girl at school would begin the metamorphosis that would change his life. >> I was not only crushed, I reinvented myself for the first time and started referring to myself for the first time as Hef instead of Hugh. >> I started referring to myself as Hef instead of Hugh. Instead of wearing clothes chosen by my parents, I started wearing yellow cords, saddle shoes, and red flannel shirts that I didn't tuck in. >> I had done the same thing once before when I was a kid. [music] When I was in high school, I was rejected by a girlfriend that I had a crush on and I reinvented myself and started referring to myself as [music] Hef instead of Hugh. >> You were Hep Hef at the time. >> Hep I signed a little I would I did a a record column for the school paper called Platter Patter and signed it Hep Hef. We're handed a life by our our uh family and peers and by society at large. And if you were smart enough, you [music] know you know, you take a hold of your life and and try to turn it into who you want to be and that certainly in the most dramatic way is what my life was all about. >> How scandalous. Hugh was determined to be the cool nonchalant guy who didn't care about things like heartbreak. >> Hugh Hefner attended Steinmetz High School in Chicago. He was one of the most popular kids in his class. >> It seems like there are still many such cases that mirror that sort of behavior today. After graduating from Steinmetz High School and making it to the top quarter of his class and served as a non-commissioned officer and infantry clerk and newspaper writer cartoonist from 1944 to 1946. >> After uh high school he went into the uh drafted into the army and spent some time in the army then came out and went through University of Illinois with a degree in psychology. >> According to nj.com, Hugh's drawing skills were questioned by his colleague and future Popeye cartoonist Will Eisner Eiseman who warned him that he better have a job lined up after the war. Hugh Hefner then attended the University of Illinois majoring in psychology. Interesting choice. While contributing articles and cartoons to the campus paper. >> They had a special school at Illinois for war veterans and so instead of going into journalism school, I took a variety of courses and majored in psychology and minored in creative writing and art specifically because I was interested in magazine work. >> One of the pieces Hugh wrote for the University of Illinois paper was a review of the 1948 Kinsey Report which some of you may know about. >> What is this thing about [music] sexual arousal that we are so ashamed of? It's one of the most attractive things in life. It It It makes for a great many people a rather tedious existence more pleasurable. >> The Kinsey Report was a mid-20th century study of human sexual behavior by Alfred Kinsey. The first report, Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, examined male sexuality followed by a report on female sexuality in 1953. >> Often described as the father of the sexual revolution, Alfred Kinsey was an American biologist who authored a pioneering study on human [music] sexuality in the late 1940s. Released in the form of two massive books, each focusing on male and female behavior respectively, [music] the study became known as the Kinsey Report. A few scientific books have caused a bigger cultural stir than the Kinsey Report. In its time, it triggered a cyclone of controversy, uproar, and even a few congressional inquiries. But, it also forever changed the way that Americans thought, talked, and legislated about Drawing on data from 18,000 [music] interview subjects, Kinsey compiled an exhaustive report on the lives of ordinary Americans. In black and white, [music] with tables and graphs and annotations, he showed that people were having more and different kinds of than what traditional Christian morality dictated. >> Kinsey's findings challenged assumptions about sexual behavior at the time, showing that behaviors that were considered rare or deviant are actually common for that [music] time. The study also introduced the Kinsey scale, which measured sexual orientation on a continuum rather than a strict binary. While all of this seems pretty obvious now, though some still deny this reality even to this day, at the time this report was pretty revolutionary and unheard of for the culture. Hefner wrote that Dr. Kinsey's book disturbed him. It disturbed him because of how many people lie to themselves. He wrote, "This study makes obvious the lack of understanding and realistic thinking gone into the formation of standards and laws." And it seems like this report and reading this report was a pretty pivotal moment in Hefner's life. He realized that the strict and almost suffocating childhood that he had, that he felt restricted by, many others may have felt restricted by as well. It seemed like Hefner became convinced that he wasn't an outlier, but that many others felt the same as him when it came to sexual behavior and just in general going against the cultural norms. And he felt so strongly about that that he dedicated his entire life to that. But, he almost became too focused on this concept. It consumed him and destroyed the lives of those around him. That being said, the path to hell is led with good intentions. This was at a time that people were noticing that repression was leading to people acting out or just being in general unhappy. But, this doesn't necessarily mean that Hefner's solution to this was correct. As it seems that Hefner intended to tear down an oppressive system so that he himself could build back up a system that worked for him and those like him but continued to oppress everyone else. >> I think the two big hang-ups in our society are money and and when you put them together, particularly difficult. >> While Hugh's biggest dream was to become a cartoonist, [music] he was unable to sell his comic strips to newspapers and he lacked the money needed to start his own magazine. To support himself, he worked in the personnel department of a cartoon printing company in Chicago, [music] but he quit after objecting to its policy of rejecting applicants who were black, Jewish, [music] or had ethnic-sounding names. In 1951, Hugh Hefner was hired as a promotional copywriter at Esquire magazine earning $40 a week. It seems [music] like Hefner's dreams had come full circle all the way back from when he was a child reading [music] Esquire and drawing cartoons, but this was not enough for Hefner. When the magazine moved most of its operations to New York City, he left and took a sales job at Publishers Development Corporation, a company that produced trade and nude magazines. >> on a number of jobs and then left Esquire. >> His colleague, Vince Tajiri, who would become Playboy's photo editor, described Hugh as very immature for his age. Vince recalled he was totally unsophisticated, but he had this obsession with sex. When he had nothing [music] else to do, he would draw graphic cartoons of Blondie and Dagwood. Hefner later moved into a higher-paying role as a circulation promotion director for Children's Activities [music] magazine. >> Hefner worked a series of magazine jobs in Chicago, first in the promotion department for Esquire magazine, then as a circulation manager for a children's magazine. It was 1953 and his wife had just had their first child, Christie. >> During this period, Hefner was married to Mildred Williams, his college sweetheart. They got married in 1949. >> You you were married one time. That's is not very often known about you. Right out of college before the magazine began. >> Mhm. >> Yeah. Have two children and she's happily remarried and I'm happily unmarried. Whatever. Yeah. >> But sweet Mildred was another person that [music] caused Hugh great heartbreak. As during their engagement, Mildred had an affair with another man, something that deeply hurt Hugh Hefner, but didn't stop him from marrying her. >> Now, in between the engagement in December and the marriage in June, my fiance told me that she been having an affair and uh it devastated me. I didn't get the message that maybe there was some question in terms of the relationship. The magic was gone from the very beginning. >> I got married at 22. In retrospect, that was a mistake, Hefner said, noting how he stopped drawing his comic book school days at the time. I was putting away childhood [music] things. I was putting away my dreams. >> I think one thing is he didn't like change and it's a pattern I've noticed with him over the years. Even, you know, he used to tell a story about how when he got married in the '50s, you know, he'd been seeing this woman and he'd been in the military and he came back and she confessed that she had cheated on him, but that made him want to marry her more cuz he had to win. Look at, you know, the story of like him dating Barbie Benton or, you know, the woman he dated right before me. Like when they wanted to leave, he would always chase after them. You know, he was a creature of habit. If he felt comfortable with somebody and they one day, you know, out of the blue in his mind say they want to leave, you know, he doesn't want that and that kind of activates him to chase more. >> The couple's first child, Christie Ann, was born in 1952. And their second, David, arrived in 1955. Despite appearing to have achieved the American dream, Hefner, burdened by family responsibilities and adult job, fell into depression. "I remember standing on a bridge, looking out at Lake Michigan and thinking my life was not going anywhere. I felt as if I had successfully become my parents. Tears filled my eyes," Hefner [music] recalled in an interview with Time magazine. >> And I remember a specific day where I stood on the Michigan Avenue [music] bridge looking out at Lake Michigan with tears in my eyes. >> In the months that followed, Hefner started developing plans for a magazine of his own. >> I went to my family and asked my told my father what I was doing and asked him whether or not he would invest or loan me some money. And he, being a conservative accountant, felt it was not a good business deal and declined. And as I was leaving, my mother took me aside >> [music] >> and said that she had some money of her own cuz she had worked during the war and she gave me a check for a thousand [music] dollars. >> The entire incident on the bridge pushed him to launch HMH Publishing Company. He used $600 borrowed from two banks and $3,000 from friends and family. >> Okay. >> [cheering and applause] >> Let's let's talk about the the magazine you borrowed. How much from your folks to start the magazine? >> I borrowed $600 of my own money and about 6,000 from various friends and and relatives. They had mixed emotions when I began. >> Yeah. >> "I worked on the idea with everything I had and for the first time in my life, I felt truly free. It was like a mission to publish a magazine that would thumb its nose at all the phony Puritan values of the world in which I had grown up," he said. To Hefner, he was pushing back at his parents and further validating the Kinsey report findings that only confirmed what he already believed, that his upbringing and those like it all around the country were a complete lie, that everyone was living out a reality with which they didn't truly embody or believe. And because of that, people were deeply sexually repressed and acting out. Hugh Hefner's solution wasn't to lean towards activism, but instead to put a mirror to their faces to show them their hypocrisy in a bold and brash way, but predominantly in a way that benefited him first and foremost to highlight [music] his comics and make his dreams of a magazine come to life surrounded by the people he wanted to be surrounded with put up on a pedestal the king of the castle. >> And with it all has come a steady assault on the Puritan ethic, a series of disquisitions called the Playboy philosophy. [music] Girls galore, a bunny equipped private jet, and a home with all the accoutrements of a satyr's daydream. >> By 1953, the Kinsey report on female sexuality had been published. Its findings, which suggested [music] that premarital and extramarital sex were far more common than people openly admitted, seemed to confirm Hefner's established beliefs. [music] Added to it the belief that women were becoming more comfortable with their own sexuality. From his apartment, Hefner and [music] a small team, including art director Art Paul and sales manager Eldon Sellers, worked around the clock to assemble the first issue, which infamously featured actress Marilyn Monroe on the cover unconsensually. >> Well, the very first playmate, but in the very beginning, the first uh for the first year, the uh playmates were calendar pictures. The very first one was Marilyn Monroe. >> Yeah. >> [music] >> So, how did Playboy become a massive breakout success? At first, Hefner considered calling his magazine Stag Party. Why? But they ended up going with Eldon Sellers' idea of the name Playboy. Hefner proposed the idea of the logo with the tuxedoed rabbit. "We want to make clear from the very start we aren't a family magazine," Hefner wrote in the first editorial, "If you're somebody's sister, wife, or mother-in-law, aka a woman viewing the magazine, and picked us up by mistake, please pass us along to the man in your life, and get back to your ladies' home companion. This magazine is for the boys. No girls allowed." It seems Hefner's open-mindedness didn't include women loving women, I guess. The main part of Hefner's budget for his first issue, which was tiny, [music] went to, unsurprisingly, the imagery used in the first Playboy issue. >> A lot of the girls that I've fallen in love with look like the girls I saw in those movies. There were a lot of platinum blondes in the movies in the 1930s. >> And this is something so wild to me, how much this was normalized in the past. As despite Marilyn Monroe appearing on the cover of the very first Playboy magazine, Marilyn Monroe never officially consented whatsoever to being a part of Playboy magazine. This is something that happens a lot in the modeling entertainment industry, mainly due to ownership over the rights of a work. If someone takes nude photos of you and they're professional photographer, they pay you for your work and you sign your rights away, that photographer then owns that work, even if that work is your nudes, and they can distribute it however they want after the fact. You might have only been paid $20 for that, but then that photographer can distribute the photographs however they please and make an endless amount off of it. If you end up becoming famous, the price of that photograph skyrockets, and you still only got paid $20. But wait, this is a photo, and you might have consented to the original photo, but did you consent to that photo being showcased in like a museum 10 years later, or being sold for hundreds of thousands of dollars? That's where the issue gets murky. The photos of Marilyn Monroe were shot in 1949, when Monroe, who was still an aspiring actress [music] at the time and desperate for cash, posed a nude for photographer Tom Kelly in exchange for $50. Tom Kelly sold his photographs of Monroe to Western Lithograph Company who turned them into calendars. Then in 1953, Hefner paid that Chicago calendar maker $500 for the photos of Monroe and put them in the first issue of Playboy making the magazine seem much more legitimate than it actually was at the time. >> I learned that a calendar company out on the west side of Chicago, very close to where I grew up, owned the rights to the already famous Marilyn Monroe nude that everybody heard about but very few people had seen. And the reason very few people had seen it is because the post office wouldn't let them send it through the mail. I'm the kid who didn't think they had that right. >> [music] >> We sold over 50,000 copies. >> So, the December 1953 issue had nude photos of Monroe that Hugh Hefner found and purchased off of an obscure company. It also contained a cartoon made by Hefner himself, a few party jokes, black and white pictures of sunbathers in California, articles on football and the Dorsey brothers, and fiction by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the British author best known for creating the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes. But that work actually cost Hefner nothing since their work already entered the public domain. All of this combined into a magazine ended up being an immediate success, the perfect bachelor dude bro magazine. Hefner quickly sold out the complete run of 70,000 copies. Apparently, Hugh Hefner had identified an untapped market and was able to quickly profit off of speaking to them. Why was that? Maybe because this untapped market ended up being men that were exactly like Hugh Hefner himself, repressed, lonely, and wanting to feel like the coolest guy in the room. >> What was the secret of his success? Why did it catch on so quickly? >> That I did not imagine before the fact. It was a matter of being in the right place at the right time, you know, with a point of view whose time had come. And what I didn't know was that there were a great many other guys out there who, you know, had these same views, and they weren't being expressed anyplace else. >> Mhm. >> So that from the very beginning, from the first few truly amateurish issues, because in the beginning we were really just learning what we were doing. I had never worked professionally in an editorial capacity for any other publication when I started the magazine. So I had to learn what I was doing while I did it. And we had no money at all, literally no money. So the first few issues were really, you know, almost a local kind of publication in in quality. And the initial reaction was phenomenal. People saw the spirit of the book and what we were trying to do, and responded to that even before the the quality was there. >> By the fourth issue of Playboy, production had outgrown Hugh Hefner's apartment and moved into a small rented office across the street from a Catholic cathedral. Hefner put a bed in the office, since he claimed he was working for 36 hours straight, and at the time was also having an affair with a nurse from a nearby hospital. After the first year, Playboy's circulation was 175,000 copies. By its fifth anniversary, the magazine surpassed Esquire, the very magazine Hefner looked up to as a child, and sold nearly 900,000 copies every month. >> idea behind Playboy was to try to put back into the total fabric of the interests of man. >> regard this as exploitation. >> No, I think exploitation is a much misused word. The magazine grew from that first 52,000 to over a million copies a month by the fifth anniversary. >> How did they do this? Hefner claimed he tried to create a magazine for the indoor guy that focused specifically on the single life. In other words, the period of bachelorhood before you settle down. [music] >> With the success of those first issues of Playboy magazine, Hefner had tapped into an undercurrent of cultural change taking place in America in the late 1950s. Soon Hefner would become the personification of that change. >> Before Playboy, men's magazines were mostly outdoor adventure books. So, it was guys hanging out with guys and the women were staying at home. Well, that was not what I had in mind. >> Hefner describing his target market reminds me quite a bit of the modern-day incel culture. He made explicit content for the indoor guy focused on single life. And now, this niche of men has become a more ostracized group in society and uses online content and material, as well as online forums, to further isolate themselves. Did Hefner simply notice this pattern, this group of men he could appeal to, maybe even being one himself, or was he an early contributor to the rise of the incel, creating the monster that we now know today? >> You created, I suppose, a kind of image of the modern American male. Do you feel any compulsion to live that image yourself? >> Man doesn't work for bread alone. >> Mhm. >> One of the things you try to buy, whether it's with money or fame or whatever, is time. I mean, time is one of the most precious things of all. So, that >> feel pressed for time? Do you feel it's passing very rapidly for you? >> Yes. >> In July 1955, an issue featured one of Hefner's girlfriends, a 20-year-old Playboy subscription department employee named Charlene Corliss. For publication purposes, Hefner called her Janet Pilgrim. >> The very first one was Marilyn Monroe. Yeah. >> And there was a But wasn't there also one of your employees working >> In the second year, our subscription fulfillment, uh >> [laughter] >> our lady in charge of subscription fulfillment was named Janet Pilgrim. And she agreed, uh in return for a piece of subscription fulfillment uh equipment, to pose in the magazine. And that was quite literally >> Wait a minute. >> Wait a minute. That was the beginning of the girl next door. No clothes >> You You approached this woman. Where was this? Back in Chicago? Yes. And very probably a very nice woman from a nice Midwestern upbringing. You said, "You take off your clothes, we'll give you a mimeograph machine or something like that?" >> In effect, a postage meter or something like that. >> Yes, in effect. >> She posed at a dressing table wearing lingerie. Beside the photo was a story that introduced her as an office worker. The [music] intent was to portray the playmate as the girl next door. Unthreatening, but frolicsome, and suggest that the world was full of such appealing women, wrote the LA Times. They could be, Hefner wrote in the magazine, "The new secretary at your office, the doe-eyed beauty who sat opposite you at lunch yesterday, the girl who sells you shirts and ties at your favorite [music] store." The plan was to sell a dream to the ordinary man, and it worked like a charm. >> Playboy takes the fig leaf off the genitals and puts it over the face. Faces of these lovely girls have no expression. They are withdrawn, detached. The aim is to play it cool. Do not to commit yourself. Don't get caught. Love without commitment. Love without responsibility. I do agree that society, you know, and that our total Judeo-Christian heritage has established women as sexual object. >> At the same time, some saw Hugh Hefner's success as built on the exploitation of desperate women. >> wondered whether a middle-aged man can find happiness with millions of dollars, all the creature comforts the money can buy, and what seems to be an inexhaustible supply of dazzling female playmates. >> Uh it's possible. >> Again, it kind of feels like this phenomenon has only snowballed in recent times. [music] Lonely men have become an epidemic in the eyes of many. The incels, a dangerous but prolific pipeline. The exploitation of women to feed content specifically targeted towards lonely men is no different as well. The growth of the porn industry and other platforms like OF, which are seen as more ethical than their alternatives, but have still become a beast of their own making. The lonely men incel demographic and this industry for women are almost two sides of the same coin, stuck in an endless loop that feeds one another. Lonely men need to have content available to them to feed their loneliness, and the explicit content industry needs to have a large group of lonely men to market to. Hefner seems to be one of the first people to identify this and capitalize off of it greatly. And while he marketed being a Playboy bunny as a very empowering thing, behind the scenes [music] we now know harm and abuse happened behind the scenes. Or he simply did something like use their images without their consent, like in the case of Marilyn Monroe. >> [music] >> I've never been in it for the money. Never was Playboy in the business for me. It has been from the very beginning a labor of love. That's pretty easy to say because because if you don't love all of this, then you're a fool. >> With the expansion of the Playboy brand quickly came trouble. As Hugh Hefner lacked any understanding of boundaries [music] and was bumping up against the culture at the time. Was he a necessary evil as he seemed to believe himself to be, or were his methods downright evil? From 1959 to 1960, Hefner hosted Playboy's Penthouse, [music] a late-night television show that was designed to look like a stylish bachelor party. >> Well, there. [music] Glad you could join us this evening. >> Black and white performers did not socialize in that kind of a setting. This was clearly, conceptually, my apartment. And black and white were hanging out together, drinking together. >> But the show ultimately only lasted a year. A decade later, Hefner tried again with another late-night show called Playboy After Dark, which aired from 1969 to 1970, again only a [music] year. Playboy After Dark had a more energetic and modern feel, but both shows would be canceled for low ratings. >> [applause] >> Well, hi. I'm sorry, I didn't see you come in. I'm Hugh Hefner, [music] your host. And you really arrived just in time, cuz it's going to be a wild and swinging evening. >> In an effort to continually [music] expand the Playboy brand, Hefner moved on to something that his readers could actively participate in. Inspired by other themed nightlife venues, like the Gaslight Clubs themed around Victorian-era [music] London, Hefner and his team created their own version as Playboy grew. The first themed club opened in Chicago in 1960 and quickly became a success. [music] The club was intended to be exclusive and stylish, where guests could come and experience the Playboy lifestyle, whatever that means. >> a Chicago mansion and expanded the Playboy brand, opening the first Playboy Club in Chicago. The club franchise spread to cities throughout the United States and around the world and made the Playboy lifestyle widely available. >> These venues combined dining, cocktails, and live entertainment in a setting designed to reflect the sophisticated image promoted in the magazine. Remember, this was the 1960s, back when Playboy was still seen as somewhat sophisticated and desirable, especially by young bachelors at the time. What particularly set the Playboy Club [music] apart was the presence of the Playboy Bunnies, waitresses who wore the brand's known costume and were trained to follow strict rules, having to speak and interact a certain way to guests and serve [music] and entertain in a particular fashion. Membership was also exclusive, adding to the experience. [music] Guests typically needed to buy a membership key to enter. While this all sounds a little bit like larping, paying an exorbitant amount of money so that you can larp the experience of being a hot, attractive, rich bachelor, [music] well, it was a huge success. Apparently, that's a desirable larping experience. Go figure. And soon, there were dozens of Playboy Clubs globally, from New York City to London to Tokyo. >> Tessa's mother, Susan, works at the Playboy Club in Buffalo from 1983 to 1986. [music] She's now a psychologist. Why did you want to do it? >> So, >> [music] >> part of it was the allure. >> One bunny decries the treatment from the company and customers [music] as degrading. Her name, Gloria Steinem, who goes undercover as a bunny at the New York Club in 1963 to write an exposé in Show magazine called A Bunny's Tale. >> But, the expansion of the Playboy brand came at a cost. At this time, there were many people outraged by Hefner and Playboy, and some who even sought action. >> You We checked this month's issue and found 20 pictures of girls in various stages of undress. Isn't that really what you're selling, kind of a a high-class dirty book? >> No, I don't think so at all. There's an important distinction here. >> Conservatives condemned Hefner and his media empire as morally depraved. And in 1963, a 29-year-old freelance journalist named Gloria Steinem published a series of scathing articles in the arts magazine Show about her experiences as a Playboy Bunny. The articles drew the attention of a budding feminist movement and elevated Steinem to its top most ranks. >> Hugh Hefner may have pushed things too far and found himself in trouble with the law. Hugh was arrested on obscenity charges in 1963, roughly a decade after founding Playboy. After he publicized nude of the actress Jayne Mansfield. While it might sound ridiculous now, at the time it was common for pornographic or explicit publications to face obscenity charges. In the 50s and early 60s, US laws around obscenity were strict and vaguely defined. Allowing authorities to prosecute material that they believed violated public morals, seemingly based on their own whim. This case became a key moment in the broader cultural debate over censorship and sexual expression in the US as the culture was beginning to shift over what was acceptable. Hugh's defense argued that adults should have the freedom to choose what they read and view. This trial ultimately ended in a hung jury. The jurors couldn't reach a unanimous decision and Hefner was not convicted. While Hefner initially held back from showing everything, in 1971 his stance changed. As the market became more popular, the competition grew. The magazine Penthouse was released and pushed Playboy to escalate their own content to allow more graphic material. >> I don't drink, I don't smoke, I don't I don't gamble, I don't go to nightclubs. I'm very unlike the average person perceives me to be because people Hefner has spent almost his entire public life publicizing himself, what he does, his parties and movie stars and all the rest of it. And so people think that I'm the same as he is. >> This even escalated further when the magazine Hustler came out in 1974. >> And as long as I'm alive and able to publish my magazine, I'll do just that. And if they don't like it, they can suck a rope because this country belongs to me as much as it belongs to them. Me and my 15 million readers deserve a right to be left alone. >> Yet exposing more didn't increase Playboy's exposure. In fact, it only made them less desirable. I feel like that's something an old man would tell me to try and slut-shame me or something. As simultaneously, Playboy began losing its popularity. And the biggest factor was more than rising competition. In the '70s, society's ideas regarding premarital sex and sexual expression became more openly accepted. It was the sexual revolution. Then by the 1990s, the rise of the internet made sexual content and information far more accessible and normalized than before. Internet porn killed the nudie magazine. By the 2000s, Playboy transitioned from a progressive publication that challenged the status quo to one often viewed as outdated and one that was overly reliant on explicit material. It wasn't a serious magazine, but it also wasn't the new and modern internet with more options for people to view. While the Playboy brand initially attracted high-profile stars in its prime, including Golden Globe-winning actresses like Jayne Mansfield, Raquel Welch, Goldie Hawn, Cybill Shepherd, Playboy struggled to maintain that level of prestige. Instead, some of the biggest names on its later issues were reality TV stars like Kim Kardashian rather than traditional Hollywood stardom. Magazines like Maxim and FHM were catching up by offering suggestive but non-nude shoots, which made them more appealing to mainstream celebrities at the time seeking publicity without long-term risk to their reputation. Playboy's longevity also worked against the brand. When Playboy was initially released, it was marketed to bachelors of the 1950s, but by the 2000s, it was viewed as the magazine that your grandpa bought, pushing away younger readers or viewers. I mean, in general, people were buying magazines less and less, and Playboy was struggling to find ways to evolve. >> It seems that when you reach a point of excess, >> that's the beginning of the end. >> I think you're that you have short-term cycles that follow that and at the same time you know the more long lasting cycles >> It appeared like Playboy's decline was inevitable and the brand struggled to adjust over time. In 2004 the publication celebrated its 50th anniversary. However, the brand was on a rapid decline. Its circulation of 3 million copies was less than half of what it had in the 1970s around 7 million copies per month. The internet filled the role of Playboy and then some especially for lonely men which was Playboy's target demographic. Trying to keep up Playboy tried to evolve by creating Playboy TV a subscription cable network that aired starting in 1982. The Playboy channel operated in a similar way to the magazines showing explicit content lifestyle programming entertainment and news. But even this format fell outdated as the rise of the internet gave viewers the freedom to choose exactly what they wanted rather than being limited to what the network decided to show which signaled the end for bastion of the brand that was still hanging on which we have yet to address in this video but we're finally tackling the darkest and most haunting aspect of the Playboy brand to this day and that's Hugh Hefner's mansion the Playboy mansion. Playboy as a brand became synonymous with the Playboy mansion a place Hefner lived along with a collection of Playboy bunnies which he kept gathered around him at all times as if they were nothing more than fancy bling and accessories. Yet the Playboy mansion in reality was really a house of horrors especially for the women who were viewed as playthings. [music] After divorcing his first wife Mildred in 1959 Hefner lived the life of a bachelor or playboy. He purchased the original Playboy mansion located in Chicago. According to the LA Times Hefner hardly left the mansion for several years in the 1960s as the home came fully equipped with luxury amenities including a bowling alley a steam room, and a dormitory for the bunnies. In 1971, Hefner purchased the infamous LA Playboy Mansion for only 1.1 million. >> Now, who gets invited to the parties? >> Friends. >> Mhm. Now, is it just unbelievable wild all night long? >> Hugh tried his hand at love again in 1988 when he married former Playmate Kimberley Conrad. They had two children together, Marston and Cooper, but separated a decade later. After his second divorce, Hugh Hefner spent the rest of his life virtually or literally with a rotating girlfriend supergroup of three to six young women who acted yet again as his Playboy bunny accessories. >> The four girlfriends for a couple of years, and when that relationship ended, I just went on for more of the same, and at one point it was seven girlfriends. A number of girlfriends is easier than one wife. >> They lived at the mansion and accompanied him to parties. >> I have not done very well with marriages. >> [laughter] >> I you know, I I tried it twice, and you know, the second time was it was an 8 and 1/2 year relationship. I was faithful to it the entire time, came out of it a little emotionally beat [music] up and bruised. And I think that to some extent when that relationship did not work, [music] it led me into into this rather unique [music] situation. >> That unique situation having multiple girlfriends at once. >> In 2009, Hefner, at 83 years old, then proposed to his main girlfriend, 23-year-old Crystal Harris. >> How old is your girlfriend? >> 21. >> And how old are you? >> I am 59. >> Yeah. Have Have you ever gone out with a 59-year-old woman? >> No. >> The relationship was at times rocky. I wonder why? What could possibly go wrong? They broke off their engagement at one point, and then got back together and married in 2012. >> I'm the luckiest guy in the world and and I know it. My dreams have come true beyond anything I could possibly have imagined. I had a stroke in 1985. Well, I survived and I got married in part as a refuge from what was going on in the 1980s and when that didn't work and I came out of it, I discovered, and I've said it before, a whole generation waiting for me to come out and play. To find the brand and myself as a human being embraced by a whole new younger generation was incredible. >> [music] [music] >> Do you ever picture yourself way in the future? Like, can you picture Hefner at 60? Because the age that you seem to be in our now seems to be about right for you. Do you think of yourself ever in way in the future? >> Sure. Sure. I think thus far I'm aging very gracefully. I think you know, life is a little better now than it was 10 years ago. >> With a dying brand and the birth of reality TV, Playboy decided to capitalize on the last bastion of the brand, all the controversy surrounding the Playboy Mansion, by producing a reality show about the bunnies in the mansion and their everyday lives. Only, obviously, you can't always trust what's portrayed on reality TV. >> Hi, early arrival. >> Hi, honey. >> Hi. Oh, not that early. Hello there. How are you doing, Holly? >> In the early 2000s, there were mainly two different distinct styles of reality shows. There were shows like Survivor and American Idol, which focused more on people competing against one another to win a cash prize. Then there were shows like The Osbournes, Family, The Osbournes, Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie's The Simple Life, and even Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County, which followed people's daily lives and proved that that's what audiences could be interested in if broadcasted the right way. Playboy's reality TV show titled The Girls Next Door aired on E! in the summer of 2005 and had a huge impact on how people viewed the mansion and Hefner. >> They were doing Growing Up Gotti at the time. >> Yes, I remember >> So they wanted to do Growing Up Hefner about Hef's two kids. >> The boys. >> Yeah, and Hef was like, "No, I don't want to do that. Like I'm not a PTA dad." Then the idea turned into let's do a reality show about the staff at [music] the mansion. An executive at E! said, "I want it to be about the girls though. I want it to be through their eyes." We were not approached. We were just told. It was very much like the way we were treated was [snorts] kind of like the way a YouTube family will just throw their kids on the YouTube. Hef even like walked by me in the hall one morning and was like, "I've decided what your characters are going [music] to be." >> It rebranded something deemed controversial into something mainstream and seen as appealing for better or for >> the lady at E! said, "I want to see through the girls' eyes. I want it to be like Alice in Wonderland." [music] And you know, he felt he had enough control over us that we weren't really going anywhere. You [music] know, when we would go out and do press about it, he'd always kind of joke like, "Daddy doesn't have to do the work." Which gag. >> The reality show showed pool parties, movie nights, and themed events presenting an almost sorority-style environment with day-to-day routines that seemed surprisingly normal. >> Hey, I'm Holly. I'm originally from Alaska and I live now at the Playboy Mansion. [music] I'm Hef's number one girlfriend. Hef and I have been dating for 3 and 1/2 years. >> You're [music] funny, sweet. >> We have a great relationship. It's the best relationship I've ever had. He says [music] it's the best relationship he's ever had, but I don't know if I believe that. Bridget told me that she's always wanted to be a Playmate. She feels like that would be achieving all she could achieve both in body and mind. >> I have a bachelor's degree in communications, emphasis in public relations, and then I have a master's degree in communications. >> What's most depressing of all is all of these elements shown on the show as well as the glamour and beauty of the Playboy bunnies gained the show a large woman audience. >> Like why do you think that is? What what do you think made the show so exciting or appealing to women? >> It was playful. You got to see us having fun all day and it was this really like oversaturated, bright, fun look into a lifestyle. Which today you can see anybody's lifestyle on Instagram, but back before social media this was really really novel. >> The series framed the girlfriends featured in the show, Holly Madison, Bridget Marquardt, and Kendra Wilkinson as somewhat independent and likeable, giving each person a distinct personality beyond just being Hefner's arm candy. >> On the one hand, it doesn't show a lot of like the sexual parts of what life in the house was about. It's really about like you as people. In the fantasy you're objects, but on the show you're the leads. Like how did Hugh Hefner feel about that? You're at a party and he's eating ice cream in his sort of hoarding bedroom covered in things. It's not glamorous for him, at least that's the in my viewing of it. >> I think from his perspective, you know, reality TV was like the cool new thing at the time. I get to have this cool TV show about my world, but they're doing all the work. [music] And then as the show became more and more popular, he wanted to be a part of it more. They would do these scenes back at the mansion that really had no point, but just a reminder that like Hef's [music] still there and he wants to be in the show. >> As the main focus of the show, they whether indirectly or directly presented the Playboy lifestyle as desirable rather than exploitative. People began wearing Playboy merchandise with the Playboy bunny logo in loungewear, t-shirts, seen as a certain aesthetic to aspire to, transforming the brand from that magazine that your grandpa used to read into centered around these bunnies featured on this reality show and this sort of glamorous lifestyle living in this mansion, which is such a far cry from the dark reality. And this is a pattern seen throughout the existence of Playboy. The brand projects the concept of revealing yourself for empowerment, which is all fair and good if that is truly your honest desire. But Playboy itself is capitalizing off of people revealing themselves in this manner and the glamorization of it all. But it's truly a house of cards about to collapse at any moment built upon the backs of the exposed women. You can see this through the looking glass and the cracks of the screen in the reality TV show as there was nothing real about Girl Next Door. Behind the freedom shown on screen, there were strict rules and expectations. While designer clothes and parties presented this glamorous lifestyle on the show, looks can be deceiving. The Playboy bunnies had allowances that were controlled and conditional. And this financial dependence on Hefner made it hard to ever leave the mansion. Many of the women feeling like they could never leave even though the only reason the Playboy brand existed in the first place was because of the women. Hugh Hefner had massive power over the women shaped by his age, wealth, and status. >> What was your like situation with your parents? Were they like excited about this? [music] Were they okay that you were like living this unconventional Hef life in the hopes that you'd be like a pathway to a bigger entertainment career? Like what were their thoughts? >> Yeah, they were fine with me being at the mansion, but I didn't tell them any details of what was going on. I just don't have that relationship with my parents where I would ever talk about anything like intimate or anything like that. >> the show came out, they just thought you were at the mansion as an aspiring model. >> Well, as Hef's girlfriend, but I think a lot of people >> romantic with him. >> Well, a lot of people back then thought it was all publicity, that it was fake. Like it was kind of like I would say the public they were kind of split. Like [music] no way they're all living there and not having but also no way he's 75. This is all fake. >> While each woman appeared authentic, many later revealed they were edited to fit specific characters and felt boxed into these roles. Despite the Girl Next Door's success, the Playboy bunnies were paid little to nothing for appearing on the show and working on the show. In a joint interview with Holly on the Juicy Scoop with Heather McDonald podcast, Bridget said that Holly had warned her the first three episodes would be hard to watch. She assumed this meant it would simply take time to adjust, but after watching them, she said she was deeply affected and described feeling traumatized, unable to sleep, physically sick, and brought to tears. >> I'm still traumatized. Like, I'm sick to my stomach. >> What makes you sick to your stomach? >> The way we were portrayed. I haven't watched all the episodes. She has cuz she's been doing the YouTube videos, but I've only watched up to episode 3 right now. And I'm traumatized. >> Yeah. >> No, when I did those first reaction videos, I was telling the viewers, I'm like, I don't know if I'm going to continue these cuz they're not great for my mental health. >> Yet, unlike Holly and Bridget, Kendra has never fully rejected The Girls Next Door. >> It was like heaven. Like, it was a heavenly experience for me. And you know, there's two things that can be right. People are like, how can you say that when you have a daughter or whatever? Like, what what would you tell your daughter? I had to do what I had to do. I was in a survival mode. I chose what I chose. I made the choice to move into the Playboy Mansion, have [music] sex for money with Hugh Hefner. >> saying, "I was a horrible teenager. I was a runaway. I sold cocaine at the age of 15. I never really [music] had a stable life." This reminds me of the term gilded cage. When people accept their cages because they seem nice and more comfortable in comparison to others. A gilded cage, but still a cage. >> There's Playboy, there's show business, there's media attention. A lot of people focus a lot on like, "Oh, you did Playboy, Playboy, Playboy." But nobody really focuses in on like, how much it takes to shoot a reality TV show. And it took every ounce of my soul. Like, that's why they call it sell a soul to the devil. >> I went looking for the wrong things. I went looking for dark things. I went looking for fun. >> How did you know that you had had mental issues and how did you know how to solve the mental issues? >> There's only one way, and that was to the hospital. Some counseling and some psych psychiatry and it was like a lot of work to like rehab my brain. I went through psychosis and I was just like I didn't know where I was. I didn't know what was going on. I thought camera I thought everyone was an actor. >> Welcome to the Playboy Mansion. >> Today is Tiffany Fallon's big day. She's Playmate of the Year. When I see a Playmate, I think you're beautiful and she gives a good name. >> We're ready to go if you are. >> Okay. >> Come on, my darling. >> I would love to be a Playmate. I would just give anything to be in those same shoes. I'm envious. I told her I'm so jealous that you're Playmate of the Year. >> But Kendra does recognize that Playboy culture had a lasting impact on her. Was I surprised? Absolutely. Did that cause me problems later in life? Absolutely. So, you know, choices. There are consequences for every choice you make. Despite requiring therapy following her exit from the mansion and claiming Playboy took every ounce of my soul, she reaffirmed I have a lot of regrets when it comes to that. I don't have regrets with Playboy and all of that. Once the original trio of Holly, Bridget, and Kendra moved out, the sixth season of The Girls Next Door introduced a new lineup with Crystal Hefner, Karissa, and Kristina Shannon. >> It wasn't until I became famous and the fans of the show really thought our relationship was cute and liked our relationship that he was like, "Oh, yeah. Maybe this is my next step." cuz he loved to reinvent himself. He was a creature of habit, but if you look at his life like every 10 years or so, he'll like reinvent himself and do another thing. I was in Vegas one night and went out with a guy. Nothing happened. It was just a guy I thought was cute, but I'm like, "I'm so confused. I feel like I need to go out." and then if I miss him and want to go back, then I know. And if I don't, then I know. And he unbeknownst to me, he had security following me that night and he called me and said I gave him the worst night of his life and I'm like, "Well, I can't do this anymore." and then he was begging me to stay and I'm like, "Absolutely not." Like I knew he was going to hold this over my head for the rest of my life. >> While the show tried to continue with a new cast, it never quite captured the same appeal. Those who were involved on the show had made an impression to the public, but still had an important story to tell of everything that had happened behind the scenes in the mansion and Hefner's house of horrors. >> [music] [music] >> What did that feel like when you sort of lay all this out and then people like, "Oh, I had no idea. Oh my god, like this abusive situation. This is a situation in which uh women are describing being sexually assaulted. This is a situation where women feel like they are captive. They feel like they can't leave, that they've been, you know, a term that we would use later is like groomed like to be there. >> I mostly got attacked when the book came out because this was back in 2015. So, like the Me Too movement wasn't mainstream back then. People didn't have a thought as to why like a casting couch could be problematic. >> Fan favorite from The Girls Next Door, former Playboy Bunny Holly Madison, with a fantastic name, released a memoir about what wasn't shown on the reality show. And she goes down the rabbit hole into the dark world of living as a Playboy Bunny. In 2015, Holly published a memoir, Down the Rabbit Hole: Curious Adventures and Cautionary Tales of a Former Playboy Bunny, which became one of the first exposés against Hefner and completely shifted, once again, how people viewed the Playboy Mansion. Madison grew up in Alaska and Oregon and was aware of Playboy at a young age, attending an open call for the magazine's search for its Playmate of the Millennium during her second year of college. >> So, I was working as a Hawaiian Tropic model at an event and Hef's doctor came and said, "I want to invite all these girls to the next party." So, super excited. Yeah. >> I know you're 21. How old was he? >> He was like a 75 or something like that, 76. Of course, when it's a big powerful person you you up to, you start to only want to see the good things. One day I didn't have anywhere to live, so I was like, I should give this I should give this a try. >> I'd look at a magazine every now and again, and the pictorials looked really classic and glamorous, she said. It seems like Holly was attracted to the glamour of Hollywood and saw Playboy as a core aspect of this. In 2000, she moved to Los Angeles to pursue acting while working at Hooters. Eventually, Holly was invited to a Playboy Mansion. What began as a one-time visit turned into regular attendance, where she became one of Hefner's girlfriends for financial stability and the chance to stay in LA. >> I was living with two roommates, and they were not renewing the lease we had, which I thought we were, and I was so broke and in such credit card debt, and I thought, well, maybe I should go out with them and kind of give this thing a try. I thought, you know, this is going to be like my crazy college-age experience that I'm going to do. And of course, I ended up getting in way deeper over my head than I ever thought. >> Though she believed it was her own decision, Holly later admitted she was unprepared and became isolated from friends who said, "You gross. You hooked up with an old dude?" Holly said that intimacy with Hefner was expected as a part of living at the mansion, partying with him, too, and their schedule was controlled with specific nights dedicated to partying with Hugh Hefner. He's like 80. You're partying at the age of 80? I'm 27, and it gets to 10:00 for me, and I'm like, okay, bedtime. [music] >> In the beginning, it was disgusting [laughter] because Hef would go out twice a week, and he'd always bring everybody back up to the room. Two different girls who lived there who had this kind of unofficial recruiter role, where we'd be out at a nightclub, and they would like spot different girls, and one of them recently like went to like a British tabloid and was like admitting to it and saying that like Hef would give all the girlfriends Quaaludes, and then this girl would go and like give other girls in the club Quaaludes, and like bring them back and to the bedroom and stuff, and it was just a nightmare. >> The first time Holly went out with Hugh, Hefner offered Holly a Quaalude, [music] telling her, as she writes in Down the Rabbit Hole, that in the '70s, they used to call these pills thigh openers. She turned him down, [music] but did get drunk. And by the time they all went back to the mansion, she was told it was time to go to Hugh Hefner's bedroom. Tina Jordan, who was at the time his number one girlfriend, brought her into the room, which was, Holly writes, like an episode of Hoarders. >> Basically, everybody would have sex, and I didn't know what to expect. Once it was done, there was something about the experience that made me feel very out of control. Feeling out of control in that situation made me want to like stick to that situation more. >> According to Holly, life at the mansion was tightly controlled, with curfews and expectations that limited her independence. On evenings when they weren't required to be home, there was a 9:00 p.m. curfew. I know. Silly, silly girl. Holly kept her Hooters job to stay connected to the outside world, but still financially relied on Hefner. >> And he's saying to me like all the things that now I know are super cliche for like Hooters, but like you're so mature for your age, you're so smart for your age. What a weird dynamic with the girls. They if anything, they try to glamorize it to the girls outside, so more girls [music] come in at times. >> Yeah. You They won't tell you anything. >> Holly also spoke about being bullied by other women at the mansion, and criticized by Hefner when she was living there, which took a toll on her confidence and mental health. >> You were pretty isolated from the other girlfriends, and that some of them were pretty nasty to you. >> Back then, I just had such a binary way of thinking, where I thought like if somebody is this accomplished and intelligent and like has the world at his feet, why would he be so petty as to like pit all these girls against each other? Like it didn't compute to me. >> She wasn't allowed to wear red lipstick, and Hefner hated when Holly cut her hair short, telling her, "You look old, hard, and cheap." It seems like really this was just all about Hefner having control over the women. He wanted them all to look exactly the same, to have no individuality that could be singled out because he wanted to be at the center and have them appear like objects that surrounded [music] him, serving only to uplift him and his image. But because of all of the bullying and cruel treatment, Holly even developed a stutter and tried to speak as little as possible because of it. As her isolation deepened, she struggled with depression and felt unable to fully open up to those around her, writing, "Drowning myself seemed like a logical way to escape the ridiculous life leading. I just [music] couldn't take my misery anymore." As morbid as this sounds, I find this passage fascinating as it mirrors Hefner's earlier life and how he spoke about himself wanting to jump off of a bridge. What if really all that happened is he simply created a world around himself filled with women that would end up mirroring his own emptiness. Holly tried to get help, but Hefner wouldn't allow her to see a therapist. I wonder why. Maybe because that therapist would tell her to get the heck out of that environment. So, Holly went to a doctor for antidepressants. >> I thought from like the outside looking in, going to these parties and kind of seeing him interact with his girlfriends here and there, like I thought I knew what it was going to be like. I thought I knew the whole drill. But I moved in and then I realized like I don't know what the schedule of this place is. Like I knew they had a curfew, like they had to be Yeah, they'd be in at 9:00. But then you get into little things like, "Okay, well, this is the schedule and this is how you're supposed to act or he'll freak out." I thought it would be fine for me to have like a day job during the day, found out that wasn't the case. >> Who was the person that was saying, "Hey, [music] no job"? >> Him. Him. >> [laughter] >> Yeah. And obviously you got paid. They paid He paid you or no? >> Well, you would get like a clothing allowance of like a thousand dollars a week. And I tried to save as much of that as I could. Like I tried to be as slick about it as I could. >> You said that like, you know, he would he would refer to himself and others would refer to him as Daddy. There's a pretty horrifying moment when a woman you refer to as the recruiter uh invites Daddy to the bed with Bridget. Did he think of you as daughters? Did he treat you like daughters? >> Yeah, definitely not like daughters. I just think it was super controlling and just super like stereotypical creepy old man who's old and wants to date a 20-year-old. >> [laughter] >> I think with a daughter I mean he actually had a daughter and I think with a daughter he thinks of that as an extension of himself. >> But Holly Madison was too ashamed to tell her parents what was happening. And in the mansion no one cared to see what was going on with her. Eventually Hefner forced her to quit her job at Hooters. It was just a dumb waitressing job, but after I was pressured to give up that job I really felt cut off from the outside world, Madison said, and cut off from any independence I had. Holly also earned nothing from Playboy as Hefner stopped putting his girlfriends in the magazine because they usually left shortly after. Again it seems Hefner just wanted to control them. Holly Madison only confided in Hefner's long-time secretary Mary O'Connor [music] and Bridget Marquardt >> Marquardt? >> who would later become her girl next door co-star. The Girls Next Door didn't immediately fix Holly's situation. Holly even saying they weren't paid at all during the first season. >> Did you have an agent at this time because there are periods of time where you had an agent. Did you have one at this moment when when E! is showing up to do this show or no? >> In college I did, but when I moved into the Playboy Mansion I no longer had an agent and we weren't allowed to work or anything like that. Even when contracts came up we weren't allowed to have like our own attorney look at the contract. No contracts, nothing. Yeah. >> Had you signed anything to be in the mansion? Like had you signed something? So you as far you have not signed a document. >> No. >> As far as you know from the you come to the house uh and then you decide to live in the house and you've never signed anything. >> No, nothing. Not until right before season five. >> But you had a I think a pretty good case to sue for a lot of money. >> They didn't blur my >> Right, which is the face of the lower half of the body. >> But it initially at least improved her experience as the group was reduced to just three women. And Holly, Bridget, and Kendra got along and benefited from travel, career opportunities, and eventual pay. Holly even secured a role at Playboy as a junior photo editor, but after five seasons as the others prepared to leave, she was faced with the reality of a solo relationship with Hefner, something she realized she couldn't handle. Holly said, "During the end, I definitely recognized that he was verbally abusive, and that's what made me snap." She added, "There were so many things in the relationship I wasn't fully comfortable with, but I was able to justify them in my mind because there were other advantages to being there." >> As you leave, is it slowly dawning on you that you need to see what happened in the mansion in a new way? >> I didn't want to think about it. I wanted to tie it up in this nice neat bow and just move on with my life. I wanted to post an Instagram photo of a certain outfit I had, and to find that photo I had to look back at this coffee table book we'd made, like a Girls Next Door coffee table book. And I was looking through it, and I don't think anybody else would be able to tell by looking at the photos, but I can tell cuz it's me. I was like, "Holy shit, I'm like fake smiling in all of these, and I'm so miserable." And I'm just like, "Okay, I just need to write a book and like air this all out so nobody ever asks me how Hef is again." [laughter] >> After leaving Hefner, Holly successfully transitioned into entertainment, appearing on Dancing with the Stars and starring in Peepshow, where she earned millions. The book ends with Holly Madison happily married to Pasquale Rotella. He's my Prince Charming, but I didn't need saving. I saved myself. And that really is the important takeaway, not that Holly ever finds the right relationship for herself and someone who treats her right, but that she's treating herself right. Holly and Pasquale later welcomed two children, and although the relationship ended in 2018, it represented Holly's evolution and her breakaway from Hefner. Following the release of her memoir, Hefner responded in a statement saying, "Over the course of my life, I've had more than my fair share of romantic relationships with wonderful women. Many moved on to live happy, healthy, and productive lives, and I'm pleased to say we remain dear friends today. Sadly, there are a few who've chosen to rewrite history in an attempt to stay in the spotlight. I guess as the old saying goes, you can't win them all. In my opinion, this response shows Hef's mentality with women. He wants to win or collect them all. To him, the Playboy bunnies were Hef's accessories. They were simply an extension of his brand instead of human beings, a way to further an evil empire. >> [music] >> I think life should be that kind of adventure till you die. I think that you can go on making life an adventure forever if you work it right. Well, not forever, but for as many years you've got. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> [music] >> All evil must die out eventually, right? Or does evil just remanifest in new shapes or forms? If evil's shape comes in the form of a crusty old rich guy like Hugh Hefner, well, at least then that evil has to die, at least eventually. And Hugh Hefner did exactly that. >> Are you afraid of getting old? No, I don't think so. And particularly not these days. And you know, the great sadness in life is the fact that we're [music] all mortal and it will come to an end. >> A year before Hefner's death, the Playboy Mansion in LA was sold for about a hundred million. This mansion was bought for 1.1 million and it was sold for a hundred million. Just let that sink in for a moment. The mansion was sold to Daren Metropoulos? Metropoulos? An entrepreneur and investor and the son of billionaire Dean Metropoulos, whose name really does sound like some sort of evil billionaire overlord. He made his fortune reviving major consumer brands like Hostess, the Twinkies brand. By 2016, Playboy was facing declining revenue and shifting away from its traditional business model, while the mansion itself had become expensive to maintain and no longer essential to the brand. Selling the property provided a significant financial boost. Included in the deal, they also allowed Hefner to remain living in the mansion for the rest of his life. On top of that, Metropoulos purchased the property right next door to Hefner's and planned to combine the two mega mansions into one super duper mega mansion. >> It's in the process of being sold to Hugh Hefner's next door neighbor, [music] in fact. That man in question, Daren Metropoulos, a 32-year-old executive with the company that makes Twinkies and the son of a billionaire investor. The Southern California home and we [music] do use that descriptive very relatively. Listed for $200 million, the sale price, however, was not [music] disclosed. Interestingly, though, uh the buyer, Daren Metropoulos, has said he will let Hef live out his days in his mansion [music] and then, one day, decades from now, perhaps, connect the two estates. >> And even though the sale allowed Hefner to stay in the mansion for the rest of his life, that would not be very long as not long after Hugh Hefner sold the LA Playboy Mansion, he ended up passing away. Hugh Hefner passed away at the age of 91 on September 27th, 2017. He died of sepsis caused by an infection with E. coli at the Playboy Mansion. >> Hugh Hefner, the publisher of Playboy, has died at the age of 91. We're told he reportedly died in his sleep and was found today with his family. Was found today at the Playboy Mansion and he died around his family. >> Hugh Hefner is buried at Westwood Memorial Park in LA. He's buried in the crypt right beside Marilyn Monroe, which he bought for $75,000 in 1992. >> So, Hugh Hefner spends $150,000, which is a lot of money at that period. It was still a lot of money, but it was a lot of money back Um so, that he could buy the grave next to her so that he could but he could lie next to Marilyn [music] for eternity. >> Wow. >> And I just feel like it's in the poor woman even in death. She's not being left alone. >> I know. And he was the one who bought the those early pin-up photos, the you know, the calendar and released them as if she had posed for Playboy. >> He said about his burial site that he bought, "I'm a believer in things symbolic. Spending eternity next to Marilyn Monroe is too sweet to pass up." Is it just me or does this feel like another non-consensual way to be in close proximity to another woman without their control? It feels a little bit twisted considering his success was tied to him releasing the photos of Marilyn without her explicit consent. And now he's lying next to her grave without her explicit consent. This is making me think a lot about where I want to be buried because imagine you die before your mortal enemy, and then your mortal enemy decides to buy the grave site right next to your grave site. So, you're buried right next to your mortal enemy for all of eternity. Hugh Hefner's death sparked important conversations about the impact of his legacy. Robin Abcarian wrote in the LA Times quoting Wendy Hamilton that Hefner probably did more to mainstream the exploitation of women's bodies than any other figure in American history. Adding that he managed to convince many women that taking off their clothes for men's pleasure was not just empowering, but a worthy goal in itself. The Guardian also described Hefner as a controlling, emotionally abusive manipulator. >> The system is set up that we're going to pay $15,000 for the centerfold, but we're going to pay you in three intervals. When you get finished shooting, when you get published, and 1 year from your publishing date >> Because you have to fulfill your duty before you get it all. >> They paid you over 2 years. That's like below poverty level. >> Then on January 24th, 2022, A&E premiered Secrets of Playboy. >> I was Miss January 1973. My photos were gorgeous. And then I became director of Playboy Promotions, but I wasn't interested in Playboy Enterprises because women were taking their power. They were in command of themselves. So, I thought, well, wow. Wow. [laughter] That's good to me. >> My bunny name was Bunny Jackie. [music] And I started working at Playboy in 1967 for 11 and 1/2 years. We definitely got paid well, and I bought a car, and I lived the way I wanted to. >> It's 1981. I'm in Chicago as the Bunny Mother. I had 70 bunnies underneath me. >> We did a lot of things to help rise these girls [music] up, and it was exciting to me because I knew that I could move up the ladder in corporate. >> There were often [music] times when I would be interviewed by a strong feminist, and she would come at me really hard. And I would just yeah, and I would answer, [music] and let them know that I was definitely in charge of my life, and [music] this was my choice. >> The docuseries was a 12-part TV series in which Hefner's former employees and partners made claims in regards to all of the dark ongoings in the Playboy Mansion. Everything that really happened there. They alleged systemic sexual misconduct and manipulation, abuse, peer pressure, blackmail, and illegal acts with minors by Hefner and his celebrity friends. >> There was a side of Playboy >> [music] >> that nobody wants to talk about. >> He didn't want people to know what was really going on. >> I have extensive electronic equipment in the house, which includes videotape equipment. Sometimes things happen in the bedroom. >> All of these [music] acts took place at the Playboy Mansion and other similar locations. The series ultimately gave a platform to voices that had previously been overlooked or dismissed. And all of these claims further validated the claims made by Holly Madison in her memoir. By bringing all of these different perspectives together, it made the stories feel more credible and harder to dismiss as one-off experiences as it shifted the conversation towards the larger pattern within Playboy. And now, Hefner's actions are mirroring a larger pattern of exploitation that we're now seeing of those in power, which begs the question, will the cycle ever stop? >> [music] [music] >> I want to put a huge trigger warning here as the content of these next chapters gets darker than what we've covered so far and goes into a lot of topics of abuse in sexual exploitation. But no one could imagine the horrors of Hefner's mansion until he died and people began to finally speak openly and publicly about the horrific abuse that took place within the mansion. >> Are you conscious of other people, a concern for other people? What you've just said sounds as though your own happiness obviously comes first. But I would say at the heart of my life, I accept the fact that I am very self-oriented. Coming to grips with that, I think is a is a healthy thing. >> Dr. Mark Saginor, nicknamed Dr. Feelgood, that nickname does not make me feel good, was Hefner's primary physician and the on-site doctor at the mansion. Saginor allegedly handed out prescription drugs freely and was rumored to be Hefner's secret lover of 40 years. Hugh Hefner was very open about his sexuality, being fluid and having experimented over the years, though I don't believe he's ever openly said that he was bisexual. Mark Saygnor's daughter, Jennifer Saygnor, lived in the mansion for several years. And Jennifer said about living there, "The experience I had at the mini mansion parties is immediately walking in, having all the men glam onto you, offering you lines of or a bowl of ecstasy. If you refuse those, they're trying to shove champagne in your face. Who knows what's in the champagne, if they've dropped anything in there?" >> One time I remember being in a limo with Hef and Anna Nicole, and we were heading to a mini mansion party at Mark Saygnor's house. It just seemed like all the girls were on the menu. Anna Nicole was right around 30 at the time. Hef made some comment like, you know, she's being phased out. [music] >> Women were persuaded to attend Hugh Hefner's parties to receive modeling contracts, which she believed was an attempt to naive women. >> In the '90s, I believe that these men around Hef saw a very big opportunity. [music] >> Hef had different men who were out there recruiting, and they would number the level of girl that they would meet. These [music] scouts would invite these girls to these mini mansions for these modeling agency parties, >> [music] >> and offer them a place to live, and offer them modeling contracts. Once you're on this path, it's very hard to find your way out. >> Jennifer claimed that as she grew older, her curiosity led her to leave her bedroom more often and observe what was happening in other rooms. This is so scary and sad that Jennifer was not ever protected, it seems, and her father was really creepy. I mean, his nickname was Dr. Feelgood. When Jennifer left her bedroom, she saw women in vulnerable situations. I would see them naked with men all around them, and I would see them on the floor on all fours, and they were on drugs. And it just really, really scared me. >> While Hefner claimed he founded Playboy as a symbol of freedom of expression, Jennifer said that really couldn't be further from the truth. I didn't realize what was going on at the time. That Playboy wasn't about freedom of expression. This wasn't about like female empowerment. This was something much deeper that was much more sinister, she said. >> The reality of life in the Playboy Mansion is shocking. How did you feel about the image of Playboy and how did it change when you were there? >> I think I clung to what I wanted it to be, and I thought I could change it into that. >> Jennifer claimed that the women who did not make the cut at Playboy were directed into the shadow mansions. >> The shadow mansions? What? >> At the shadow mansions, my father, Dr. Mark, and the inner circle from Playboy created clones of the Playboy Mansion on a smaller scale to sort of lure these young girls in, she said. It was very predatory. According to Jennifer, these settings were presented as opportunities for modeling through staged photo shoots. Some women were given drinks that left them disoriented and were encouraged to pose without clothing. These girls were clearly drugged and not coherent, Jennifer said. They would also have somebody videotaping them, and then that videotape could be used as blackmail so they wouldn't tell anyone or so that they'd sort of fall into this underground system of being available. Then powerful men took advantage. It is bizarre to hear how often this supposedly happens. And why haven't we heard about this sooner? Now that so many powerful men are being exposed for having done this for supposedly years. >> Jennifer alleged that basically any powerful, wealthy man in Los Angeles was given access to the women. As if becoming involved with Playboy as a young woman causes you to get sucked into a dark underbelly with no escape. You're drowning and evil men with bad intentions keep pulling you under. Jennifer claimed that she once entered a bathroom and saw a European model named Paulina who'd been living at her father's home lying down in a pool of blood. Security came and picked up her lifeless body and brought it into the back. And they're like, "We've got it from here, kid." And I never saw her again, she said. Jennifer claimed one of her father's friends, who she didn't name, also drugged and SA'd her. The fact that her own father put her in this situation is so angering. And just goes to show, if she wasn't protected, absolutely no woman was protected there. But Jennifer was not the only person who made claims that frequent SA and drugging took place at the mansions. Multiple women shared Jennifer's experience and claimed to have been drugged without their consent. Lisa Loving Barrett, Hefner's executive assistant during the late 1970s and 1980s, would confirm his use of Quaaludes. At the Playboy Mansion, Quaaludes were seen as a necessary evil because they made women do virtually anything. >> Down the line were used for sex. >> They called them the leg spreaders, you know? I mean, and I don't know that I want to get that crude, but that is what the whole point of them was. We would have prescriptions in some of our names. There were prescriptions in Sandra's name and Hef's name, my name. >> That's just straight up evil to think that way. According to Hefner's ex-girlfriend Sandra Theodore, he often used and repeatedly asked her to order for him. She also claimed the drug was so wildly available that even Hefner's dog became addicted after licking it off the floor. Sounds about right, if I'm being honest. But from the recounting of these women, what makes me so sick about all of this is it's not just like this was a fun party house where people could live freely as Hefner believed of himself where he was allowing people to let go of the strict rules of society. No, it seems like from the account of these women, drugs were utilized for the purpose of manipulating them, using them, taking advantage of them, letting their guard down so that they could be by Hefner and those around him in the Playboy Mansion. Dr. Mark Sagnor, who many women ended up trusting as their doctor, even though it seems like he was just as bad as them all, often encouraged the women to undergo breast augmentations and allegedly told one woman that cocaine would cure her asthma. His own daughter, Jennifer, said even she was encouraged to get plastic surgery at only 15 years old. I mean, this mansion seems like an absolute nightmare, a house of horrors for the women involved. Hugh Hefner's obsession with plastic surgery was said to be his way of maintaining control over the women, ensuring they all looked the same and didn't have any unique features, his very own collection of dolls. Holly Madison recalled about the plastic surgery, "The plastic surgery amongst the girlfriends in the mansion was compulsive. Everyone was doing it with very few exceptions." >> Was there pressure to like look a particular way? >> The explicit pressure, you know, from Hef was more to stay thin. It's like, "Well, I really want to be in the magazine and I'm not getting picked. So, what do these other girls have that I don't? Maybe I should get my nose done. Maybe my boobs need to be bigger." >> Imagine you're being used, constantly hooked up, and then on top of that, having to recover from very intensive surgeries. It's the perfect environment for anyone to be used, manipulated, exploited. However, Hugh Hefner didn't just want to control his employees and bunnies. He also wanted to control those in positions of power. Former Playboy employee PJ Masten and Holly Madison have claimed that revenge was hidden, stashed in the mansion to use as collateral against those in power. Hugh Hefner demanded that all sexual encounters in the mansion be filmed, whether he was involved or not. >> tapes on everybody. >> He would do the, "Oh, well, I can turn it off. If it's not okay, I'll turn it off." >> Week later, a couple days later, all of a sudden, there's [music] the tape. >> He told her that you weren't recording this. Cuz you think I really stopped it? >> His butler reportedly said that the tapes were stored in a library in Hefner's office, which was off-limits to everyone except for him and his long-time secretary, Mary O'Connor, with strict consequences for anyone who touched it. "When you go out with Hef, he's taking all kinds of naked pictures of these women when we're wasted out of our minds, and he would print like eight copies for him and all the women. You pass them around. It was just gross," Holly Madison explained when asked about the tapes. She also said that the existence of these recordings contributed to her fear of leaving, worried about how they might be used against her. I mean, considering how Playboy started with Marilyn Monroe and her photos being used unconsensually, it seems Hugh Hefner just believed he had a right to people's explicit photos, their unconsensual explicit photos, to use them however he wanted. According to Stefan Tenebaum, Hefner's valet from 1978 to 1981, Hefner had hidden cameras in every room, along with hidden microphones in the garden. Hugh Hefner obviously has major control issues, because why do you need to monitor people that much? And this mirrors a lot of abusive, toxic people in power that we know today, who monitor and record everything because they have a need to control everything and use things as blackmail. Feodor claimed that Hefner invited high-profile journalists to the mansion so that he could record them doing something incriminating and use it as blackmail, which could then be used to maintain control over his public perception. >> Most of the time, Hefner never participated. He just watched. He was a voyeur. He would stage them. He thought of himself as a film director. He didn't want to be on the tapes. He wanted these girls and the stars. But many of the girls were devastated after what they were expected to do, what they were forced to do. Well, can you imagine after he had all these tapes of you having sex with different girls? What power he had over these men? >> This entire situation just conjures up so many similar cases that have been circulating the news recently in which powerful men have done similar things. Multiple lawsuits and reports have alleged that at Sean Diddy Combs private parties called freak offs, sexual encounters were sometimes filmed including without consent. Some accusers claimed those recordings were used as leverage or collateral to keep people silent and compliant. Jeffrey Epstein has also been long accused by victims and investigators of having surveillance cameras in his properties with some claims suggesting he may have recorded encounters involving powerful individuals possibly for leverage. With all of these accusations, there's a distinct pattern. >> [music] [music] >> Hugh Hefner was in his own world. If you look at photos, he thought he was the king, the emperor. We were just his servants, explained Stefan Tennenbaum, Hefner's valet. Another strange aspect of Hugh Hefner is his diet. According to Stefan, Hefner drank around 35 to 40 Pepsis a day wrapped in special red napkins. He mostly ate two to three pounds of M&Ms and red licorice. How did this guy live as long of a life as he lived, especially with how many drugs he took as well on top of all of that? This truly has me believing that evil never dies. There were 150 rules. We had to follow them exactly, Stefan recalled. We were told you cannot talk to the girls. You're not their friend. You don't work for the girls, you work for Mr. Hefner. Nikki Garcia, a January 1972 Playmate of the Month, said the environment was cold like. Claiming women were groomed to believe they were part of the family, while Hefner treated them as though he owned them. She also claimed there were instances of Playmates overdosing and others taking their own lives. These experiences made Garcia consider writing a book. However, Hugh Hefner allegedly ended up sending someone to buy her silence. I had a bodyguard. I was that afraid, she said. Sandra Theodore, model and actress and Hefner's former girlfriend, alleged that Hefner had a master key, which allowed him to enter any room in the Playboy Mansion, and he used that master key freely. She recalled an instance which he entered a woman's room while she was asleep, sat on her bed, and forced himself on her. I was standing there and I was terrified, she said. As she and Hefner were heading back to the master, he allegedly said to her, "Well, did they think they were going to come stay at my house and not sleep with me?" She still regrets that night, asking herself, "Did she think I'm a monster because I didn't stop it?" Whether they consented or not, if she wanted something, he would take it. He rifled through so many decades of young girls. Susie Crabtree, May 1983 Playmate of the Month, recalled Hefner handing her a pill and a soda. "I just took it, not thinking much about it," she said. However, Susie later felt uneasy about what she'd taken and couldn't clearly remember what happened afterwards. "I don't remember laying down. I don't remember if they even said anything to him about Playmate of the Year. I woke up with him on top of me. He was naked, my pants were off, my pajama bottoms were off. I thought I was having a nightmare because it didn't seem possible. She expressed feeling shame the following day and believed she had to keep the experience a secret despite continuing to see him regularly. He never mentioned it. The only explanation is that he was hiding it from me to make me doubt that it happened, maybe to make me forget about it, but you don't forget. Similarly, the 1980 Playmate of the Year, Dorothy Stratten, was brutalized and physically destroyed by Hefner, according to Stefan Tetenbaum. >> Dorothy Stratten was the most perfect Playmate to ever enter Playboy world. >> Thousands of girls come through through the mansion, through the magazine, thousands of them, and they don't get murdered, but one did, Dorothy Stratten. >> There are many documentaries on Dorothy's her deranged husband. With Dorothy, I believe that Hefner certainly didn't act in a gentlemanly way. >> The security guard told Stefan Tetenbaum to return to the butler's pantry and keep his mouth shut. And that's what I did. You had to follow the rules. You had to be discreet, be quiet, carry on, Stefan said. While I understand that everyone was so scared of the repercussions if they spoke out, it feels like the bystander effect where everyone thinks that someone else will say something eventually, that someone with more power who's around what's happening will speak up and protect the woman, but no one ever did. Nothing ever happened for years, and because of that, so many women were victimized, used, beat. Of course, even if they ended up going to the authorities, nothing would have happened probably, as we've seen with cases like the Diddy case, but it's still just so disheartening to think that nothing ever happened for [music] decades. Lisa Guerrero, television host turned sports sideline reporter turned investigative journalist, so [music] extremely brilliant, successful woman, which just goes to show the misconception that people have about victims in situations like this, that they're dumb [music] and naive is incredibly untrue. Recalled meeting Hefner for the first time, Playboy in many ways is the reason I am where I am today. In my early 20s, I was a Playboy lingerie model, Guerrero [music] said. I went to the mansion when I was 20 and 21. I first met him when I was 20. Hefner came in for like an open-mouth kiss and I went like this, I imagined turning her head to the side. And it was like a dog slobber on me, but I could tell he did not like that I turned my head. Guerrero was the celebrity cover model in the January 2006 issue of Playboy magazine. Her experience proved that even high-profile guests could feel pressured in that environment and that Hefner was not afraid of crossing boundaries regardless of someone's celebrity status. Holly Madison [music] had discussed her experience inevitably sleeping with Hugh Hefner, who she described as very mechanical and robotic in the bedroom. The reason I think the mansion was very cult-like is because we were all kind of gaslit and expected to think of Hef as like this really good guy, Holly said. And you started to feel like, "Oh, he's not what they say in the media. He's just a nice man." Karissa Shannon, one of Hefner's girlfriends from 2008 to 2010, along with her twin sister Kristina, detailed her first encounter with Hefner when the twins were only 19 years old and Hefner was 83 years old. Karissa described how he was forcing her head down you know, [music] to participate in an act while his hand was shaking because he was so old. Karissa recalled waiting for an opportunity to leave, watching the time pass until Hefner was asleep. After which the twins, meaning they were there together, which is also very disturbing, quickly went back to their room. We hit the showers steaming hot. Our skin was red from just trying to like sterilize. Both of us said, "He's going straight to hell." Kristina also noted how Hefner doesn't use protection. Christina claimed that an STD outbreak ended up spreading among the women and they were diagnosed with chlamydia by an 83-year-old man. I remember going down to Mary O'Connor's office, his assistant / I'd say house mom for us, and she's like, "Well, that's what happens when you're sexually active." Barf. Also, the condescension. We freaked out when she said STDs are normal when you're actually active. We're like, "Everyone's out of their mind here." When the twins were about 20, they planned on undergoing a rhinoplasty and a breast augmentation. Why? They are gorgeous as is. However, after the twins had their blood test done, Karissa was informed that she was pregnant because he doesn't use protection. "I didn't think it was possible to get pregnant with Hef when he was at that point 84 years old. You don't really think that it would happen," Karissa said. "I freaked." She said she pleaded with staff not to inform Hefner or his assistant. want him to want me to have the baby. I didn't want to be stuck even more inside that bubble." She described feeling disgusted with her body stating, "I just wanted to get it over with." >> I had no idea until the blood test for my surgery. We had plans to get our noses done and our boobs done. So, I got a call saying, >> [music] >> like, "Hey, you're pregnant and you have the surgery coming up." I'm like, "Who else knows about this?" And they're like, "Well, we just called you." And I was like, "Don't call Mary. Don't call Hef. Don't call anyone." I didn't want him to want me to have it. I didn't want to be stuck even more inside that bubble. >> We'd be downstairs and he'd have three security guards watching me and watching Karissa. And they would always in the morning come up with a report of every single thing we did that night the very next morning for him, she said. Noting that who they spent time with, what they ate and drank, and when they left and returned to the property was all documented. Again, this need for control. Kristina added that Hefner described them as wild. Maybe he thought they were wild because they were 19 years old and he was 84. He allegedly ordered security to place them on HMH arrest, which stood for Hugh Marston Hefner. >> [sighs] >> Oh my gosh. He locked us in our bedroom. There would be a security guard sitting outside the door. He had so much power. It's like you're in a cult. I mean, this is like the evil king and the princesses locked in the tower. Why are the security guards complying and locking 19-year-olds in their rooms, sitting outside the door for their 84-year-old boyfriend? The fact that no one did anything, I guess just kind of speaks to how afraid everyone was of Hefner. >> [music] [music] >> But, Hefner wasn't the only person that inflicted harm onto these women, or I guess girls in many cases. Several women have claimed to be victims of sexual and physical assault by Hefner and his associates. And these instances not only occurred in the mansion, but at Playboy parties, corporate offices, in clubs, and during promotional events. To think that some of these instances happened during professional settings is extremely disturbing. And the depravity went far beyond imaginable. Sondra Theodore, Hefner's living girlfriend from 1976 to 1981, alleged that he had intercourse with his own dog. I walked in once and he was gestures to imply to my dog, our dog. And I said, "What are you doing?" He says, "Well, dogs have needs." There were other instances of stuff relating to dogs, but it honestly is more disturbing than I would like to discuss in this video. So, we'll just leave that one here for now. PJ Masten worked for Playboy from 1972 to 1982 and revealed that VIP members of the Playboy nightclubs were said to have free reign, which allowed them to do whatever they pleased. >> Somebody could fondle you, or somebody can grab you, and it was made [music] very clear to me after I transferred up there. It's exactly what Playboy was all about, the Mad Men experience. >> She recalled an instance where Soul Train creator and host Don Cornelius allegedly kidnapped and SA'd two bunnies. It was probably the most horrific story I've ever heard at Playboy. This story is the story [music] of a massive cleanup that never hit the press. Masten claimed that Cornelius, a well-known Playboy VIP, invited two bunnies to a party at his home. The bunnies went with him, but suddenly disappeared for 3 days. We couldn't figure out where they [music] were, Masten said. One eventually called for help, saying that they'd been held at his house. When Playboy security retrieved them, the sisters were allegedly bloodied, battered, and dru- Masten alleges they were held in separate rooms, restrained, and subjected to severe abuse. But, after rescuing the sisters, instead of involving the police, Playboy security reportedly just decided to handle it internally and told the victims to stay quiet. PJ Masten said that no investigation followed, and the entire thing was successfully covered up. Cornelius was never charged. However, years later, Cornelius would be convicted on unrelated domestic charges in 2008. Unsurprisingly, Bill Cosby also frequented the Playboy Mansion, especially during the 1960s to 1980s. While there one evening, he met PJ Masten for the first time. He said to me, "Well, come on up, and we'll have a drink before we go to dinner." PJ Masten went upstairs, and when asked what she'd like to drink, she responded Grand Marnier. He gave me the glass, I took two sips, and that's the last thing I [music] remember until 4:00 the next morning. She woke up in Cosby's bed injured and bleeding. After returning home, she spent a long time in the shower. I was in the shower for a good hour and I knew I had to go to work because I had nobody to cover me, she said. Later that morning, Bill called her office. How he got that private line, I don't know. It was a private line and he says, [music] "Why did you leave?" And I was like, "Are you kidding me?" Sadly, PJ Masten wasn't the only victim, as of course we know now. The accusations of SA against Cosby multiplied and multiplied over the years, but the situation gained mainstream attention all the way up in 2014. One case involving Andrea Constand led to criminal charges. Finally, a 2018 conviction finally ended a prison sentence, things that don't come to enough of these guys. Although that conviction was later overturned in 2021. Melanie Myers, a celebrity astrologer who was neighbors with Paige Young, November 1968 Playmate of the Month, recalled Paige Young telling her that someone within the Playboy Mansion circle had filmed her during a sexual encounter. Young died by suicide in 1974 at the age of 30 and was found under a collage of photos and news clippings which featured the words Hugh Hefner is the devil. >> My name is Melanie Myers. I lived in a duplex [music] in West Hollywood and Paige Young was the girl that lived behind me in the carriage house. She was literally the girl next door. Paige was an artist. I found her lying on the American flag. I found her and there was a a large wall and on this wall were all these different pictures and at the top of this mural of hers >> [music] >> was Hugh Hefner is the devil. >> [music] >> Overall, I can't help but feel like Hugh Hefner has gotten away with with evil doings of the highest degree. I feel like those news clippings and that phrase is very fitting. >> Stefan Tetenbaum, Hefner's valet, who ended up being a frequent guest at Playboy Mansion parties, recalled an incident where NFL superstar Jim Brown assaulted a woman. >> Jim Brown is there a lot and he's crazy on. >> Who is? >> Jim Brown. >> Jim Brown. Well, he has, you know, he has some trouble on and off. >> Well, you see that. >> One of the things that happens, one of the very nice things that happen at the mansion is that everybody kind of mellows out. It has developed a reputation as being kind of a Shangri-La, a sort of escape from the jungle that's out there. >> Stefan claims that Hefner continued allowing Jim onto the property where similar incidents occurred. At the time, Jim Brown was a huge NFL superstar, won three MVP awards, received nine all-pro selections, and appeared in nine Pro Bowls. About the assault at the mansion, Stefan Tetenbaum said, "He cracked ribs. He dislocated jaws, but nobody was going to come forward because nobody wanted Hugh Hefner to come after you." Similar to Cornelius and Cosby, Jim Brown would be arrested at least seven times for assault, mainly against women. In 1965, he was arrested in his hotel room for assault and battery against an 18-year-old, Brenda Arieus. Though he was later acquitted of those charges. In 1968, Brown was a charged with assault with intent to commit murder after model Eva Bohn Chin was found beneath the balcony of Brown's second-floor apartment. However, the [music] charges were later dismissed after Eva refused to cooperate with the prosecutor's office. Then in 1985, Brown was charged with assaulting a 33-year-old woman. The charges were later dismissed. In 1986, Brown was arrested for assaulting his fiance, Deborah Clark. He was released after Clark refused to press charges. In 1999, he was arrested and charged with making terroristic threats towards his wife, Monique. He was later found guilty of vandalism for smashing her car with a shovel, and they remained together until he passed away in November 2023. Rebecca Armstrong, September 1986 Playmate of the Month, recounted multiple modeling gigs that were disguised as job opportunities when she was actually just being sent to go on a date. Playmate Promotions sent her to Alaska for what was meant to be a modeling job, but instead, she ended up traveling around the state with a man who later tracked her down after she returned home. He found out where I lived. I honestly don't know everything that happened. He hurt me. He did a lot of really horrific things. That is horrifying, and the company, Playboy, sent her to this situation. After she managed to get away, she reported the incident to Playboy's security team, who, according to her, handled the situation without requiring her to testify. I didn't have to do anything. They took care of it. That's all I know. Rebecca added that Playmates were often placed in situations that were very difficult to escape without giving in. These accounts made the operations at the Playboy Mansion resemble prostitution or even a sex trafficking ring, a house of horrors where women were treated like playthings for the Playboys. >> [music] [music] >> Mere moments before the first episode of the documentary series aired on January 24th, 2022, Playboy released a statement disassociating the Playboy brand from Hugh Hefner. When throughout Hugh Hefner's life, he did everything to ensure the Playboy brand was tied to himself and his own personal image and his Playboy mansions. Playboy's statement said, "Today's Playboy is not Hugh Hefner's Playboy. We trust and validate these women and their stories and we strongly support those individuals who have come forward to share their experiences." Following the documentary, there were also former models who claimed to ignorance to victims stories and almost refused to validate them. Actress and former Playmate Jenny McCarthy appeared on the No Filter with Zack Peter podcast saying she declined to be in the documentary as well as host Secrets of Playboy. "I didn't have the same experiences, so I wasn't going to sign up for a paycheck and be salacious when I didn't experience those things." she said. "You're telling me she didn't see or hear of anything once in her entire time at the mansion? And now that there's so many reports from other women, for Jenny to turn her back just because she's not experienced anything feels very selfish and a way of completely denying these women's experiences. McCarthy first posed as Playmate of the month for the magazine in 1993 and was named Playmate of the year in 1994. She appeared in the publication sporadically through 2012. McCarthy frequented the home in the 1990s when Hugh Hefner was married to Kimberly Conrad. "I'm so grateful that when I was there, Hef was married to Kimberly Conrad and it was kind of run like a strict dormitory." McCarthy explained. "Like we weren't even allowed near Hef or around the house. It was almost like Catholic school to be honest." It feels like quite a stretch to say. Jenny described that time period as safe for her and her peers, but expressed hearing some of these girls stories was really rough. >> Have you seen the Secrets of the Playboy documentary and what are your thoughts? >> They had asked me to um host >> Oh. >> that show. They wanted me to really be involved and be an executive producer and be a numerous times where I had to on the sixth time said, "No, I love the production company." I'm going to put that out there cuz I do love them who did it. Um, but because I didn't have the same experiences, I didn't experience those things. And hearing their stories, my heart broke for a lot of these women. So, I think I went in there in a window of time that was kind of safe. >> Yeah. >> But hearing some of these girls' stories was really rough. >> So, you don't want to back up those stories and support them? Despite her having a more positive experience than other playmates, Jenny does claim that unfortunately, for every 20 guys, it was one girl. So, the guys were just in heaven. But also, the guys were over 70 years old. Oh god, they were like really, really old. It was like Viagra central. >> I didn't have that experience. Pamela didn't have that experience. I was there when his kids were throwing bacon at me in high chairs. I went to the party, so I got to see a lot of that action. For every 20 guys, it was one girl. So, it was the guys were just in heaven. But also, the guys were like over 70 years old. >> How were the guys in heaven? Because there were too few girls? >> Because there was like only hot women and the ugliest dudes. They were like really, really old. It was like Viagra central. Someday I can maybe tell some of the funny stories of it all, like girls hunting for Hef in the middle of the night when he was married. I'd be like, "What are you doing? Stop it." Or girls hot waxing their poon and I'm like, "What's happening?" >> of 2024, Hefner's widow, Crystal Hefner, released a memoir titled Only Say Good Things: Surviving Playboy and Finding Myself. It tells the story of her life inside the Playboy Mansion and her relationship with Hefner. >> What what narcissist traits did he have? >> Um, he was controlling. He was manipulative. He only wanted to speak about himself. So, as long as I was talking about him or something to do with him, it was fine. >> Crystal explained that she initially moved into the Playboy Mansion after being invited to a party, replacing Holly Madison as Hefner's main girlfriend. >> Were you feeling special? >> Yeah, I was feeling very chosen. >> Yeah, that's what it feels like a little bit. >> Like the little green aliens in Toy Story. >> Yeah. What was the first thing he said to you? >> Uh he asked me what "Hi, I'm Hugh Hefner." And in my mind I'm like as if I don't know what your name is. I'm like "Hi, Crystal." And he asked me where I was from and what I did and yeah, we were just chatting for a while. And then he said, "We have movies throughout the weekend. I'd like to invite you to come in the house and come stay for the weekend." And >> Is he charismatic? Is he charming? He is all those things. He must be, right? >> Yeah, yeah, yeah, he was, yeah. >> But and your friend at this point, where is she? Your your extroverted friend is behind the rope? >> I don't know if we were separated on purpose or if it was because she wasn't his type physically. I'm not sure. >> But she didn't come. >> She was not invited. >> Looking back, that's kind of a big moment, right? Cuz it >> changed my life forever. >> Completely. >> Yeah. >> Drawn by the promise of access and power initially, she quickly became immersed in a world that was difficult to leave. "Once you went in, it was so hard to find a way out," she said, which seems to be the general consensus for many women. "I think broken women gravitate towards something like that. I still don't understand why." >> Is it competitive in there with other girls and it really is? >> Yes, very. I talked to a couple people who have been in cults and I feel it we related so much. >> In what ways? >> Feeling like you're nothing without the specific person and being controlled, manipulated. Hef's secretary once said to me, "Hef takes in the broken ones." >> Crystal's story mirrors Holly's in many ways. What first appeared glamorous soon felt restrictive as the walls started to close in. Life in the mansion was highly controlled. The girlfriends had a strict 6:00 p.m. curfew. What? 6:00 p.m.? They weren't allowed to work. Probably so they were financially dependent on Hefner and again couldn't leave. They had to line up for a weekly allowance. She describes the environment as having a gross vibe, calling it a space where misogynistic actors preyed on women. Despite being the lead on a season of The Girls Next Door, Crystal received nothing while Hefner's company earned $400,000 an episode. After becoming Hefner's main girlfriend, she began questioning the relationship. How us? I mean, that would probably depend on your type of relationship dynamic and the agreement between each of you, but if you're not comfortable with that, then it's not okay. She does admit, I did things that I wasn't comfortable with. I wasn't physically attracted to an 80-year-old man. I was just trying to get through it. Things changed when she realized, I had no freedom. Everything was based on Hefner's schedule and I never got a say, which highly contradicts Playboy's image of liberation and freedom. She described the relationship as transactional, but never clearly defined. You went into his orbit offering all of yourself and you had no idea what you would get back. This dynamic ultimately blurred power and control. You know, anything he wanted, I became his mirror, like I reflecting his self-importance back at him. Yeah, people ask me a lot like, "Oh, why did you stay? And if it was so bad, why did you stay?" And like, I didn't have the tools then. I didn't realize then. You know, I didn't really know what a boundary was. Everyone loves him, so you just think, "Okay, it's maybe something's wrong with me." Power is insidious when it masks itself as generosity and generosity is insidious when it's camouflage for control, she wrote. And both power and generosity are confusing when they gaslight you into believing they could be love. You know, Hef would give us little bits of money here and there, but never enough to be substantial cuz he never wanted to give us enough to where we could leave. Every Friday he would make us like ask for it or beg for it, what he called allowance. I do believe that it was some social experiment in time that will never be repeated again. It can't ever be repeated again. The the world has shifted and I'm collateral damage from that from that time. >> Even after getting engaged, Crystal felt like another object in this crowded house, a thing. After being denied a cut of the $800,000 Hefner received for a wedding episode of their reality show, she decided to run away. But crossing the driveway, she heard his voice boom over the mansion loudspeaker telling employees to detain her. That's when a light went off, she says. I was like, "Okay, my feelings do not matter." >> Well, he certainly did chase you down when you left. >> Yeah. >> Mhm. >> Yeah, he did and maybe it took me leaving for him to be to finally be told no. >> Yeah. >> Or losing something or someone. >> She tried to leave once more, telling the guards she was going out to buy tampons, but she returned a year later at the age of 25 to find Hefner had labeled her Playboy cover with runaway bride stickers, just exploiting and capitalizing off of something that was very traumatic for her. They eventually did get married in 2012, but Crystal became seriously ill later linking it to Lyme disease, breast implant illness, and toxic mold exposure saying the mansion was literally killing her. >> I mean, a toxic environment, so much of going on. It has to mentally mess with you and mess with your health. After 2014, when literally Hugh Hefner got so old that the >> sexual expectation stopped, her role shifted to being a caregiver. During this time, she also went and destroyed Hefner's collection of explicit photos. Her feelings towards Hefner remained conflicted. She suggests in her book that he was a broken little boy trying to fill this void. She states he was good at getting women to surround him and create the illusion that he was not alone. Again, like he was this incel that felt alone and empty inside and wanted to use women as objects to fulfill this feeling of loneliness. Reflecting on her own experience, Crystal compared it to Stockholm syndrome, saying that she played mind games with herself to try to survive. After his death, she began to process what happened, especially with Me Too stories. I felt justified, but you get brainwashed. Like, "Oh, this is just how men are." Ultimately, she chose to speak out, saying she has nothing to hide and wants to tell the truth, not just to re-examine Playboy's legacy, but to help others in confusing and maybe emotionally abusive relationships. >> It got to the point where I would ask somebody specific to like, "Oh, can you come up?" Because I didn't want to do it by myself. Yeah, this part was not enjoyable at all, so ever. No. >> Jennifer Saginor, the daughter of Hefner's personal physician, Dr. Mark Saginor, believes that the former bunny chose to stay. Jennifer accused Crystal of continuing to promote the brand, stating after she's made millions of dollars, she's come out saying she was held against her will. >> The money Hugh Hefner left you, it was about Was it 5 or 7 million? I'm saying different >> Um we bought a house um that was around 5 million and I I ended up selling it for pretty much what we bought it for. >> Uh-huh. Did he leave you any money? >> What he thought he would leave for his children and his legacy and all of that was mainly tied up in Playboy stocks and they severely tanked. >> I mean, to be fair, I would say that abusive dynamics can be far more complicated. People's responses to situations can also be complicated as well. It might look like they're choosing to stay or they want to stay, when in reality, they're trying to placate the abuser or are stuck in an abusive cycle. In fact, I think it's very normal for a lot of people to try and exploit their own trauma and abuse, particularly in our capitalist system, as a way to try and turn their into some sort of positive thing, even if it means further exploiting themselves. Yet, online reviews of Crystal's memoir echo the same sentiments, suggesting that maybe she fabricated a lot of her story, victimizing herself even though she wasn't really a victim, making up this idea that she was held against her will all for more financial gain. Holly Madison and Crystal also have some long-standing beef. In April 2024, during an appearance on the Lady Gang podcast, Holly Madison said, "Anyone who's read my book that came out 8 years ago and then read her book, Crystal's book, tell me the narrative voice doesn't sound exactly the same." >> Crystal's doing her book right now, and she's come out being like, "I just was never really happy there." Oh, yeah, I read it. This is a hot take because as a woman, like I can't have any criticism cuz it always has to be like women supporting women. Um anybody who's read my book that came out 8 years ago and then read her book, tell me the narrative voice doesn't sound exactly the same. >> Oh. >> Yeah. Drives me up a wall. And I'm not saying when I say narrative voice, I don't mean of course they're going to be writing about a lot of the same things. Like we dated the same person. We might even come to some of the same conclusions. Like if you take my book and Kendra's book, it's two completely different people even though we lived there at the same time. Like it's two completely different voices as it should be. We know what happened. They went in a conference room and someone was like, "You know, it was great. Holly's book was great. You should We want a book like that, but your story." >> Hefner's son, Marston, seems to kind of be on Holly's side of the situation and doesn't get along with Crystal whatsoever. Marston appeared on Holly and Bridget's Girls Next Level podcast, where he criticized Crystal and said she was chasing fame and fortune. >> She says in her book it was because she didn't feel like she was fairly compensated for the runaway bride special, but what I heard years ago was it was because she was unhappy with the pre-nup because her your dad wanted to give her $2 million in his will and she said, "That's not enough. That's not enough to buy a house. I'm being taken advantage of." That's what I heard. I also heard she was like asking for like $5,000 a week in allowance while she was there, which is like fine if that's what you want to ask for and that's what he agrees to. I studied real estate investment at UCLA when I was there. Like I was on like the regular allowance everybody else was on. I know what's doable and you don't leave there with eight properties in Los Angeles. >> Yeah. And that's kind of my point, too, where it's like >> Be real. >> Crystal responded in an interview with Us Weekly saying, "I feel that obviously he has a lot of pain and hurt from the relationship or lack thereof with his father. And there are some things I think he's trying to heal or get answers to that he's realizing may never be answered. So, maybe he's filling in the blanks themselves." >> In my opinion, when Crystal came in, there started to be like tribes. And so, there were people who were like on Crystal's team. I remember being like kind of scared to ask people for permission for things. I would text Crystal saying, "Hey, is it okay if I sit on the couch um for the movie night?" Or, "Hey, is it okay?" I remember reading in Crystal's book, like she felt invisible. And she felt like she didn't matter. And she felt like nobody cared about her opinion. And then she noticed that like when she was around my father, people treated her differently. >> Mhm. >> And they started to like listen and they started to maybe be scared of her a little bit. And I think that feeling of like I matter is addicting. She liked controlling the guest list. She liked taking girls off and on the guest list depending on how she whatever the whims were at the at the time. >> Crystal was the last person to be with Hefner up until his passing and she witnessed a lot of things in the mansion, a lot of harm, and ultimately had the most power overriding the wrongs of Hugh Hefner and the Playboy legacy. So, I think it makes it easy for many people to direct the accountability of Playboy and Hugh Hefner Crystal's way in demanding answers. Yet, instead of doing so, people became frustrated when it seems like Crystal only tried to further profit. Instead of understanding that, Crystal claimed that Holly and Bridget were trying to sabotage her and pull her life apart. So, where does the Playboy legacy go from here? This might sound random, but sometimes when scrolling through Depop, I'll [music] see clothes with the Playboy logo pop up. In fact, that happened to me recently in the process of making this video and flashes of this entire story come to mind. The fact that young people were wearing Playboy [music] and its logo as a fashion statement, meanwhile this entire dark underbelly of abuse took place. Playboy and Hugh Hefner is [music] an example of how abuse and exploitation can hide itself under the guise of empowerment [music] and how we as people consuming media have to practice discernment over the various lies being sold to us. The sad truth is Hugh Hefner is not the only evil man in power and he's not the last to be exposed. So, there's to be learned from his story and his life so that we can recognize the red flags as they may pop up in the future and ideally help prevent more people from being used in the future. And that's all for today's video. I hope you all are doing well. I hope this video wasn't too triggering, but more shining a light on the darkness. Lately, I've been finding silly uplifting memes that are really cheesy, but I've been sharing them with my friends um and I thought I would share them with you all as a little up lifting part at the end of the video. So, I will put one on screen right now. This one is the horrors persist, but so do I. Let me know if you have a funny or uplifting meme or saying in the comments below. Oh, and also for this video, I'll be putting helpful links down below if you yourself are in need of helpful resources and I hope you're doing well. I'll see you in the next video. Stay well until then. Bye. >> [music]