Only Say Good Things: Surviving Playboy and Finding Myself by Crystal Hefner

Author:Crystal Hefner [Hefner, Crystal]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Biography
ISBN: 9781538765678
Google: UqW8EAAAQBAJ
Amazon: 1538765675
Barnesnoble: 1538765675
Goodreads: 145630693
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2024-01-23T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 10

Stick to the Schedule

Mondays were for the men. Hef called it Manly Monday.

Every week a group of Hef’s friends joined him for movie night, men only, no women allowed. They gathered together for dinner, discussion, and a movie. Hef didn’t join them for dinner, instead choosing to eat in his bedroom. He never joined the buffet downstairs, preferring to eat the same pre-movie food on a tray in his bedroom—canned chicken noodle soup, saltines, and a block of cream cheese. Later he would have his regular dinner of pork chops and mashed potatoes if he was still hungry, or if it was a sex night, he would have a BLT sandwich.

Every night was movie night, but Mondays were for Hef’s acolytes—a group of long-standing friends, his brother Keith, Ray Anthony, Richard Bann, Kevin Burns, and others in his inner circle. They would bring articles that featured Hef, and they all would read and discuss and feed and flatter his ego. He was keenly interested in any bit of media that talked about him, and bored by anything in print that wasn’t about him. He knew about politics and could opine when it counted, but in truth any news that wasn’t Hef news was dismissed as irrelevant. Three Mondays a month they would talk about old movies—12 Angry Men, The Maltese Falcon, Some Like It Hot, On the Waterfront, Citizen Kane—the list was endless. Then they would vote on which movie to watch after each person discussed why they chose that particular film. They discussed the actors endlessly and dissected everything about them, even more than the plots or themes in the movie.

One Monday a month they dissected women. Hef would use that Monday to pass around the latest issue of Playboy, and the men would peruse the magazine like a Playbill and discuss the merits of each body part of the women featured. These men, all over the age of fifty, reviewed, they passed judgment, and they voted. Satisfied with themselves after combing the latest issue, they settled in to watch a movie. Sometimes I fantasized about gathering a group of women together and passing around a photo of a naked man so we could pass judgment, so we could point out all their flaws. It was just a fantasy, though, because that would never have happened.

But more and more my mind entertained these innocent but subversive thoughts, while the rest of me went along with the program.

I loved Mondays. It meant my curfew was nine-thirty p.m. and not the usual six p.m. Sometimes I went to Mary’s house to play cards on Mondays, but only because it was a good thing to do politically. It still felt like being in the mansion, and I didn’t want to waste my one late curfew. Whenever I complained about my curfew, the staff would always say, “Nothing good happens after nine-thirty p.m. anyway.”

In their way they were trying to comfort me, but being controlled never feels comfortable.

Tuesday was game night—dominos and Uno—girls and Hef only.

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