| Occupation |
CEO of Playboy
- Notes:
-
Career built on guts, family ties -- and skin
BY CHERYL L. REED STAFF REPORTER
To comprehend the seemingly conflicting worlds of Christie Hefner, an a
rdent feminist who runs a skin magazine, you must understand that she i
s foremost a businesswoman. "To achieve things motivates me -- to be su
ccessful," said Christie, 51, who runs the Playboy empire from downtown C
hicago. "I'm just one of those classic personalities that just wants to d
o the best I can at whatever I do, whether that's wrapping a present, t
hrowing a dinner party or doing my job."
Her job is chairman and CEO of Playboy Enterprises, which last year pai
d her $1.44 million in salary and bonuses -- more than double what she r
eceived in 2002. Her business world, family relationships and political a
ctivism require Christie to circulate among an incongruent cast of char
acters.
Perhaps the most eccentric figure of Christie's universe is her 78-year
-old father, Hugh Hefner, Playboy's founder. Christie calls him both "D
ad" and "Hef."
"My father and I have a hyphenated business-family relationship," she e
xplained. "Because he's brilliant, I would be foolish not to want him i
nvolved in the big decisions of the company. But we almost never talk b
usiness is the truth of it."
About every six weeks, Christie flies out to the Playboy mansion in Los A
ngeles where Hugh lives with six girlfriends, former Playmates who romp a
round the sprawling estate in lingerie and boast about group trysts on V
H1.
"When he's dating that many women, I don't spend as much time with him,
" Christie said. "I haven't tended to go clubbing with them. I'm usuall
y there on Movie Night, when there are a lot of people around."
Christie says her father's prowess is no marketing ploy. And although s
he insists she has never been embarrassed by him, she lets it be known t
hrough her publicist that she dislikes questions about his lifestyle. S
he says she's comfortable at the mansion, which might seem extraordinar
y for a woman whose own fantasy was to become a senator or a Supreme Co
urt justice.
Christie admits she has a "gift" to move effortlessly from corporate ex
ecutive to hanging out at the mansion to plotting with feminist politic
os to gossiping with girlfriends.
"It never occurred to me that you could only be comfortable with one gr
oup of people, one set of friends," Christie explained from Playboy's h
eadquarters, where murals of naked women stare down at those brave enou
gh to stare back.
In an era when corporations try to avoid even a blush of sexuality, the P
layboy offices at 680 N. Lake Shore Dr. team with young, attractive fem
ale corporate types in smart glasses and short skirts who stroll past f
ramed centerfolds and young male computer geeks who gaze at breasts tha
t fill their computer screens.
Christie's ease in these different milieu has allowed her to turn aroun
d a gentleman's magazine from plummeting losses in the 1980s to produci
ng 18 foreign editions from Taiwan to Russia and expansion to cable and t
he Internet. In the last five years, losses have totaled $107.2 million
; the last full year profit was in 1998, when net income totaled $4.3 m
illion on $314.4 million in revenue. Christie projects a profit this ye
ar.
Today, the Playboy bunny ears are among the world's most famous brands. A
nd the woman leading the company both embodies and believes the Playboy p
hilosophy: Women can be sexy and powerful.
"Playboy readers don't see a difference between desiring women and resp
ecting women," Christie said. "They have no problem reading a magazine t
hat tells them that lesbians should have custody rights, and when a wom
an says 'no' -- even if her panties are off -- it means 'no,' and looki
ng at Cindy Crawford and saying: 'God, she's beautiful.' "
Christie says that today's young women don't have the sexual hang-ups p
revalent among earlier generations of feminists.
"They are completely empowered by sexuality," she said. "There's not a c
hance that they see themselves as victims. They are absolutely confiden
t in demanding that their rights and their interests be taken seriously
. They want to be attractive and successful, and they aren't going to g
ive either one up."
A Chicago girl
Christie Hefner was a year old in 1953 when her father started Playboy o
n their Hyde Park kitchen table. From its beginning, Playboy was a fami
ly project: Hugh's mother, Grace Hefner, loaned him start-up money.
Christie's parents separated when she was 2 and her mother, Millie, was p
regnant with Christie's brother, David. The couple finally divorced in 1
959. A year later, Millie married a Chicago lawyer, Ed Gunn, and Christ
ie and her brother's last names were changed to his.
The family moved to Wilmette, where occasionally Hugh dispatched a limo
usine to pick up Christie and David for brief visits on birthdays and h
olidays to his 72-room Chicago Playboy mansion.
While at Brandeis University in Boston, Christie only disclosed to clos
e friends her father's identity.
"Any time you have a family member or a parent who is a celebrity, you h
ave to be careful about volunteering that information," she said.
In 1971, the summer after her freshman year, Christie went to work at t
he Boston Playboy Club as an assistant to earn money for a car.
When her mother and stepfather divorced the summer after her junior yea
r, Christie changed her last name back to Hefner. She was spending more t
ime with her father, who had moved to Los Angeles, where she would visi
t for days instead of hours. At the time, Hugh was dating playmate and a
ctress Barbi Benton, only a year older than Christie.
"I can't remember a time when I wasn't older than his girlfriends," sai
d Christie, who remains friends with Benton.
First job was writing for newspaper
With a degree in English and American literature, Christie got her firs
t job in 1975 as a writer for the Boston Phoenix newspaper. It would be h
er only job outside Playboy. Within months, her father persuaded her to b
ecome the special assistant to the Playboy president in Chicago.
Christie thought she would work at Playboy for a year and then go to la
w school. But she found the business challenging.
One of her first responsibilities was opening a boutique called Playtiq
ue that sold Playboy-branded merchandise. Christie asked her mother to w
ork at the store. When the boutique closed in 1980, Millie moved over t
o the human resources department, where she worked until retirement thr
ee years ago at age 75.
As a result of Hugh's move to Los Angeles in 1971, Christie and her mot
her, whom she calls both "Mom" and "Millie," felt comfortable working a
t her father's company in Chicago. Her brother, David, also worked for P
layboy as a free-lance photographer from 1973 to 1975, but he prefers r
unning his own computer firm in northern California, Christie said.
Christie claims she never thought she'd run Playboy until she saw a TV i
nterview in the late 1970s in which her father dubbed her the heir appa
rent.
In 1982, when Playboy racked up losses of $51.7 million, Christie decla
red she would save the company and proposed becoming president. Her fat
her and the board agreed.
So, at the age of 30 -- seven years after starting as an assistant -- C
hristie was in charge.
Her saving strategy was to divest the company of divisions that weren't p
rofitable: record producing, book publishing, resorts and the Playboy C
lubs. She pumped money into electronic media and cable.
Three years after Hugh's stroke in 1985, Christie was named CEO. Hugh s
till controls 70 percent of Playboy's voting stock, and Christie owns a l
ittle more than 1 percent.
During her tenure, the magazine has remained the nation's No. 1 men's m
agazine in the country, with circulation about 3 million. The company b
rags that Playboy was the first national magazine offered on the Intern
et. The online business reported its first profit this year of $3 milli
on.
Mixing politics with business
Christie has also established herself in Chicago's business and Democra
tic political community. In 1979, she was part of the group that founde
d the Chicago Network, comprising Chicago's powerful women. In 1982, sh
e started the Committee of 200, an international group of women busines
s owners and executives, and she helped raise $30 million to build the C
hicago CORE Center, an HIV/AIDS research clinic.
She has worked on the political campaigns of Harold Washington, Dawn Cl
ark Netsch, Carol Moseley Braun and Barack Obama.
In 1995, Christie married former state Sen. William Marovitz, now a rea
l estate developer. She was in her early 40s, and Marovitz was nearly 5
0.
"From the time I was a kid -- maybe because my mother was divorced twic
e -- it was never a goal for me to get married, and never a goal for me t
o have children," said Christie. "With Billy, I think it was the classi
c: I met the right guy at the right moment."
Lunching with feminists
Christie's female friends, both personal and political, are among the m
ost important relationships in her life, she says. She has stayed close w
ith her girlfriends from high school and college. Every summer, she and h
er five bridesmaids vacation together.
"It's more fun than you can imagine," she said. "I love my friends. I n
urture them. I care about them. One of the things that gives me great j
oy has been being involved with my most personal female friends and the
n, in these larger ways, with groups of women."
Christie keeps a standing monthly luncheon with other women activists. L
oosely called Ladies Who Lunch, these women have met for 12 years and o
ften are joined by local and national politicians who seek their suppor
t.
Despite their staunch feminist values, none has questioned Christie abo
ut what she does for a living.
"I don't assume they are readers of the magazine, either," Christie sai
d.
At least one famous feminist takes a different stance.
"Only Christie can answer the question of how she reconciles Playboy wi
th her own feminism. I have a lot of sympathy for her," Gloria Steinem t
old the Sun-Times. "It must be like being the Jewish daughter of an ant
i-Semitic father -- or the lesbian daughter of Dick Cheney."
Steinem made her mark as a leading feminist when she worked undercover a
s a Playboy bunny in the 1960s and wrote about her experience. "In a wa
y, Playboy has become more pernicious than other porn magazines by buyi
ng a few respectable bylines," Steinem said.
But Christie's feminist friends and politicos contend that Playboy is m
ainstream, that Christie uses her position to advocate for abortion rig
hts and against censorship.
"I don't feel uncomfortable with what she does," said Julia Stasch, hea
d of domestic giving for the MacArthur Foundation. "We feel she's a sis
ter. Her actions really speak loudly where she is and how she feels. Sh
e is smart, committed, articulate and passionate."
Marjorie Benton, a Democratic Party fund-raiser, has known Christie for n
early three decades and is a regular Playboy reader.
"The longer, more thoughtful articles are the best there are. I don't l
ook at the pictures," she said. "Her father started a sexual revolution
, and she is part of that family and chooses to carry on that business.
"
"It never occurred to me that you could only be comfortable with one gr
oup of people," Christie Hefner explained from Playboy's headquarters.
- Source:
- Newspaper article
Page: Chicago Sun Times
Quality: Secondary
Source Text: Career built on guts, family ties -- and skin
In 1995, Christie married former state Sen. William Marovitz, now a rea
l estate developer. She was in her early 40s, and Marovitz was nearly 5
0.
- Source:
- Newspaper article
Page: iVillage.com
Quality: Secondary
Source Text: Although Hefner and her husband, real estate developer and attorney Wil
liam A. Marovitz, don't have children, her father has two sons, born in 1
990 and 1991, with former 1989 Playmate of the Year Kimberly Conrad. If a
ll goes according to plan, Playboy Enterprises will remain a family-run b
usiness and carry on -- if not with exactly the same message of liberat
ion first embodied by Playboy, with the same desire to tap into the zei
tgeist
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