Nearly a decade after Hugh Hefner’s death, his widow is still grappling with the alleged abuse she suffered while married to him for nearly five years — and is fighting over private images she says were taken without her consent.
“I had to sleep with strangers I didn’t even know,” Crystal Hefner, 40, told Page Six in an exclusive interview. “It was humiliating. It was embarrassing.”
In February, his attorney, Gloria Allred, announced regulatory complaints in California and Illinois over the Hugh M. Hefner Foundation’s handling of his private archives, including approximately 3,000 albums allegedly containing intimate photographs.
Crystal said some images were taken without consent and raised concerns about possible images of minors. Hefner’s sons Cooper and Marston, whose mother is Kimberley Conrad, have disputed the implication.
Crystal said she wanted women to hand over the material – and for intimate or non-consensual images to be destroyed.
“I think he kept all that, all those women in there as trophies,” she told the Post.
“He would just name one, you know, Monday, Wednesday, and it would be a naked woman. It’s disgusting.
“He had a sex book, a black book in which he recorded everyone he slept with.”
Crystal, a model and former Playboy Playmate, was 26 when she married Hefner in 2012. She remained his wife until his death in 2017 at the age of 91.
“I came from a broken home. I didn’t have a father,” she said. “Hef chose people he could easily manipulate.”
Her accounts of sexual pressure echo allegations made over the past decade by other former girlfriends of Hefner, including “Girls Next Door” stars Holly Madison and Bridget Marquardt.
Crystal said Hefner built his Playboy empire by collecting women with “broken wings” before subjecting them to “humiliation rituals.”
Even his longtime secretary, Mary, recognized this pattern, according to Crystal.
“Mary told me… Hef picks the ones that are broken. He picks up the ones with broken wings,” she said.
“He should have gotten us a therapist instead of a one-way ticket to his room.”
Being married to Hef and living in the Playboy mansion hardly resembled the image of a carefree pleasure palace presented to the public.
“It was like a ritual of humiliation up there. And it was all orchestrated by this man,” said Crystal, who still struggles to understand why she married Heffner.
“It’s something I think about every day. If I could go back…I absolutely wouldn’t have.”
In an Oct. 14 episode of the “Consider Before You Consume” podcast, Crystal criticized Hefner for dating twin sisters while he was in a relationship with her, saying “incest suited him” in reference to his involvement with the siblings.
She also alleged that Hefner treated women as sexual conquests and that she had a particular interest in sleeping with a Playmate and her daughter.
“It was kind of a game for him.”
Crystal also took aim at comedian Jon Lovitz, calling him “one of the biggest perverts” in Hollywood and claiming he was Playboy Mansion’s “#1 customer,” during Tuesday’s episode of the “Lisa Guerrero Unleashed” podcast.
“He would be up there all the time,” she said.
“Her eyes were going back and forth (looking at) all the women coming through the door at the party.”
Lovitz’s rep did not respond to Page Six’s request for comment. In a video obtained by Page Six, he joked that he took the “No. 1 customer” claim as a “compliment” and said that “Hugh Hefner was one of the kindest, most generous people.”
Hefner’s reputation took a major hit in 2015, when Holly Madison — one of the three original stars of E!’s “The Girls Next Door.” – published his tell-all memoir, “Down the Rabbit Hole.”
“I learned that Hef was the manipulator,” she wrote. “He pitted us against each other. »
Hefner rejected her account, accusing some former partners of choosing to “rewrite history in an attempt to stay in the spotlight.”
“Girls Next Door” star Bridget Marquardt later described the pressure surrounding her first sexual encounter with him.
“I was hoping I could just observe and not participate,” she recalled on 2022’s “Girls Next Level.”
Her assessment of her time at Hefner’s was nevertheless mixed: that same year, she said that “98 percent” of her experience at the mansion was positive.
Kendra Wilkinson, the third original star, told People in 2024, “Playboy really ruined my whole life,” describing deep regrets over her relationship with Hefner.
Hefner, however, insisted that his lifestyle was authentic and described it as one of “immense satisfaction”.
“It doesn’t get any better than this, and I know that,” he told CNN in a 2010 interview.
“What you see is the real deal. I mean, life is basically who I am.”
However, in the later years of his life in silk pajamas, Hefner’s business was in decline.
Playboy’s circulation increased from about 5.6 million in 1975 to about 800,000 copies in 2015, ABC News reported. The magazine, which featured sexy centerfolds and nude celebrities since its debut in 1953, removed nudity from its pages in 2016.
The trend reversed the following year.
The mansion was sold for $100 million in 2016, half its original asking price, in a deal that allowed Hefner to continue living there until his death.
Inside, according to Crystal’s previous accounts, glamor had given way to dust, mold, and neglect. She described the property in 2024 as “dilapidated and disgusting”.
The widow found common ground with one of Michael Jackson’s accusers over the pain of seeing their alleged attackers idolized, and the two share a therapist, she said.
“I thought about how hard it must be to see someone who hurt you so much be put on a pedestal and still revered and glamorized,” she said.
“I just hope that in 2026 we don’t glorify predators.”
She said her decision to now speak out about her marriage to Hefner was driven by her concern for other women.
“You don’t have to be in the Playboy mansion with Hugh Hefner to experience abuse,” she said.
“It happens everywhere, every day.”
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