In a new book, Hugh Hefner’s third wife, Crystal Hefner, finally opened up about her harrowing marriage to the Playboy mogul and all the shocking things that went down behind the Playboy Mansion’s walls.
When Crystal married the then-86-year-old Hugh Hefner in 2012, it wasn’t that she didn’t love him. It was more that she was convinced he didn’t truly love her. Becoming a wife to the senior at just 26, Crystal said in a revealing E! News interview that she cared and loved the mogul but felt as though he mistreated her.
In Crystal’s recently released book, “Only Say Good Things: Surviving Playboy and Finding Myself,” the 37-year-old opened up about how abusive her relationship with Hugh Hefner was. The magazine publisher was apparently controlling and cruel and would often make harsh comments about her weight. He would tell her what to wear and, in the worst moments of all, had a ritual where he would pop a little blue pill during Playboy Mansion movie nights. This was Hugh’s way of telling Crystal that he wanted her to “perform” for him, whenever he wanted.
Crystal told E! that the entirety of their five-year marriage was extremely traumatic, saying, “It was emotionally abusive. It was very restrictive. I didn’t realize how bad it was until I was away from it for a while.” The marriage ended in 2017 when Hefner died at the age of 91.
She commented that she often felt trapped in the marriage and never felt as though she had a way out. Although she would often have fantasies about a world that she would “finally feel free and happy” in, she knew it wouldn’t happen while she resided at the mansion. Because of that, the model and TV personality would often push these negative feelings and instincts to the back of her mind.
She expanded, “I remember being 21 and walking up the stairs to Hef’s bedroom after a party and something inside me is telling me, ‘This is weird.’ But I’m like, ‘OK, let’s just push that down, let’s not listen—and let’s just go!’”
Hefner, unfortunately, made this beauty feel as though she wasn’t good enough and would place unrealistic aesthetic demands on her. She admitted that she changed everything about herself, and although beauty is completely subjective, she only tried to fit most of what Hugh saw as beautiful.
Although she was wary, she was equally grateful to be “chosen” by the magazine mogul, who was rarely challenged and would often lounge the day away in pajamas in his bizarre playground visited by the rich and famous.
Crystal spoke to E! about the vulnerable circumstances that eventually led to her life-changing decision to date and marry a man 60 years older than her, commenting, “My dad passed away at a young age and my mom and I were completely broke. We had nothing, we just made ourselves small.”
At one point, Crystal and her mother lived in a bedroom in another family’s house. All of Crystal’s life, she felt as though everyone else was better than her. So when Hugh chose her, she finally had the feeling that she was special due to being picked by one of the most famous men in the world. Crystal had the insight that “it’s really interesting what that feeling does to you.”