Secrets of Playboy. A candy pink world of darkness.

I watched Secrets of Playboy recently and it's been in my head ever since. When I was growing up, everyone knew Playboy. Kids and adults alike. It was something older boys and Dads kept at home, it was talked about on TV shows and in movies, it was as ubiquitous and American as Coca-cola or McDonalds. Everyone knew the jokes about reading Playboy just for the articles but I don't remember anyone ever talking about what it was like for the women in that world. Secrets of Playboy does that.

I've never read Playboy, but I did watch the Girls Next Door series when it first screened. An early reality show about Hugh Hefner's three girlfriends, Bridget, Kendra and Holly, I remember slightly baffled about why these young, beautiful women would want to spend their time cooing over an old man shuffling around in his pyjamas and pretending to enjoy backgammon nights with Hef and his old men friends.

It just seemed to be understood back then that this was a fair trade-off - their youth and beauty for his money and power. No one was getting hurt, so it wasn't a big deal. Later, I read Holly Madison's book about her time with Hefner (her role in the Girls Next Door show was to be the baby-crazy one who desperately wanted to marry Hef) so I knew that some women were getting hurt in that world but the Secrets of Playboy documentary covers a longer time period and talks about women in the organisational side of Playboy as well as those posing for the magazine.