Elayne Lodge/Playboy EnterprisesHugh Hefner has broken his silence.
In her recently released memoir, Down the Rabbit Hole, the Playboy founder's former girlfriend, Holly Madison, made several claims about Hefner's behavior during her time in the famed Playboy Mansion. Excerpts from the book made headlines, and on Monday, Hefner finally addressed Madison's allegations.
"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 remain dear friends today. Sadly, there are a few who have chosen to rewrite history in an attempt to stay in the spotlight," he tells E! News in a statement. "I guess, as the old saying goes: You can't win 'em all!"
"The stories in the book speak for themselves," Madison told E! News in a statement Monday. Per Hefner, they have not spoken to each other in four years.
Madison moved into the Playboy Mansion in 2001. Recounting one of her first experiences with Hefner, she claims he offered her a Quaalude at a party, telling her, "Usually I don't approve of drugs, but you know, in the '70s they used to call these pills 'thigh openers.'" Madison declined Hefner's alleged offer.
Recalling her first sexual experience with Hefner—and several other women—Madison writes, "Much to my surprise, my turn was over as quickly as it started. By the time I was able to wrap my head around what was happening, Hef had already moved on to Candice, then to a few of his actual girlfriends before finishing off by himself, as he always did. I have never had a more disconnected experience. There was zero intimacy involved. No kissing, nothing. It was so brief that I can't even recall what it felt like beyond having a heavy body on top of mine."
"I remember feeling really s--tty about it the next day," she writes.
The next day, Madison asked if she could move into the mansion. "That might seem counterintuitive—I'm not into it, but I'll come back for more.' But I felt stuck in my life, trying to make ends meet. I lost the lease on my apartment. I felt like I'd already thrown myself to the wolves, so I might as well reap the rewards and not just be one more slut who walked through those doors," the model, 35, writes.
According to Madison, Hefner gave the girls a weekly clothing allowance of $1,000 and offered to pay for any plastic surgery they wanted. In return, the girls were expected to follow his rules: Any night they weren't out clubbing, they had a strict 9 p.m. curfew. Wednesdays and Fridays were deemed "club nights," with sex always to follow. Sunday was movie night. "Armed guards would enter the mansion with giant film cans to screen the newest Hollywood blockbuster for us," Madison recalls in her memoir. "Often times celebrities or other important Hollywood power players would join us and be relegated to spending roughly two hours squirming in uncomfortable folding metal chairs." Additionally, Madison claims Hefner said girls could not wear red lipstick, have outside boyfriends and or talk to the male staff.
As time went on, Madison felt isolated in the mansion. "There were days I woke up and just felt like falling to the floor because I felt so depressed," she writes.
Madison claims she begged Hefner to let her see a psychiatrist. "He said, 'No, I'm not going to let you see a psychiatrist, because they're just going to tell you to leave—go talk to my secretary about it,'" she alleges. "So I just started planning how I was going to see someone on my own." From Madison's point of view, she writes, "He's basically admitting that he knows the situation is messed up."
Before long, Madison says she began to see a psychiatrist behind Hefner's back.
There were also issues between Hefner's girlfriends. Several years after Bridget Marquardt and Kendra Wilkinson-Baskett became Hefner's main girlfriends, too, Madison had an epiphany. "I learned Hef was the manipulator and that he pitted us against one another," she writes. "I realized I wasn't treated well."
Suffice to say, Hefner is not the man Madison once thought he was. "The only thing he ever gave me is a little bit of fame," she writes. "Fame is not always worth it."
So why write a memoir? "I wanted a chance to just tell my story and talk about where I was coming from and kind of set the record straight because I feel like everybody else in that situation had the chance to do so and I never did," Madison recently told E! News. "I was just the one who was quiet for so long."
Madison said she has "absolutely" no desire to ever speak to him again. "After some years have passed, I don't really find him to be a very genuine person. I feel like if I were to get on the phone with him, everything out of his mouth would be PR B.S. I just have no desire. I don't even care what his reaction is to this. I'm doing this for me and I'm doing this so people can learn from my mistakes," she told E! News.