An “explosive” 10-part documentary detailing the dark side of Playboy is about to air in the US.
The New York Post reports Secrets of Playboy is a “damning” series that “unmasks the once-heralded late [Playboy] mogul” Hugh Hefner.
The once-iconic figure who donned silk pyjamas and a smoking jacket was allegedly a predator with a penchant for beastiality – and all will be revealed in the docu-series, according to The Post.
“He was a predator,” Hefner’s ex-girlfriend Sondra Theodore, told the publication.
“I watched him, I watched his game. And I watched a lot of girls go through [the Playboy Mansion] gates looking farm-fresh, and leaving looking tired and haggard.”
Hefner, who died in 2017 at the age of 91, famously had a ‘harem’ of girlfriends and former Playmates at the Mansion.
They even made a television show about it – The Girls Next Door.
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Director Alexandra Dean had just wrapped up production on the Paris Hilton documentary This is Paris when she was approached for the new project.
She then spent a year during COVID uncovering the untold stories of the Playboy Mansion and the people within it, including former girlfriend and Girls Next Door star Holly Madison, who has described the Mansion as “cult-like”.
“The reason I think the Mansion was very cult-like, looking back on it, is because we were all kind of gaslit and expected to think of Hef as, like, this really good guy,” she told Page Six.
“You had a 9 o’clock curfew, you were encouraged to not have friends over. You weren’t really allowed to leave unless it was, like, a family holiday.”
Madison also alleged that Hefner “regularly” took – and shared – photos of scantily-clad or naked intoxicated women without consent.
This claim has just been backed up by Hefner’s widow, Crystal Hefner, on Twitter.
I found thousands of those disposable camera photos you are talking about @hollymadison. I immediately ripped them up and destroyed every single one of them for you and the countless other women in them. They're gone.
— Crystal Harris (@crystalhefner) January 25, 2022
“I found thousands of those disposable camera photos you are talking about @hollymadison,” she wrote.
“I immediately ripped them up and destroyed every single one of them for you and the countless other women in them. They’re gone.”
Theodore had even more scathing remarks, claiming then-50-year-old Hefner “groomed” her as a 19-year-old.
“He groomed me and twisted my mind into thinking his way was normal,” she said.
“He introduced me to drugs. I’d never had a drink or a drug before going up to the Playboy Mansion. And my first night there I was handed champagne and the drugs came later, and I was underage.”
She also alleged she caught him in a compromising position with one of her pets.
“I walked in on him with my dog and I said, ‘What are you doing?’ I was shocked,” she said.
“He made it seem like it was just a one-time thing, and that he was just goofing off. But I never left him alone with my dog again.”
Hefner’s son Cooper has hit back at the “salacious stories” on Twitter.
Some may not approve of the life my Dad chose, but my father was not a liar. However unconventional, he was sincere in his approach and lived honestly. He was generous in nature and cared deeply for people. These salacious stories are a case study of regret becoming revenge.
— Cooper Hefner (@cooperhefner) January 23, 2022
“Some may not approve of the life my Dad chose, but my father was not a liar. However unconventional, he was sincere in his approach and lived honestly,” he wrote.
“He was generous in nature and cared deeply for people. These salacious stories are a case study of regret becoming revenge.”
The A&E documentary Secrets of Playboy, is out today in the US. It will air on Sunday, April 24th on Foxtel in Australia.
