Tongues were abuzz immediately as word circulated around the grand room at the Beverly Garland Hotel where the Summer 1995 Hollywood Collectors Show was being held on June 24. Long before the days of The Girls Next Door and he had sealed his reputation as a creepy, perverted old man, Hugh Hefner entered the building. He was with a minor acquaintance of mine, Dick Bann. Dick was co-author of two of my favorite books, Laurel & Hardy (the giant picture book) and Our Gang: The Life and Times of the Little Rascals – which happened to be the book that I was toting around collecting signatures for my friend Henry Sorenson. Although Dick and I are not exceptionally close, we have certainly grown to be friends over the years.
But anyway, back to Hef. I saw him from across the room just browsing (he wasn’t there in any official capacity) and quickly scanned the dealer tables to see if there was something for sale that I could have him autograph for me. There were a couple of Playmates on hand, one of them being Cynthia Myers…who I met on this day for the first of three times. She had several issues of Playboy for sale and the one seen at the top left was the cheapest of them. She was not the covergirl or Playmate in this issue, but there was an article on her film Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. Since I was shelling out $25.00 for this issue (25 times the original cover price!), I had her go ahead and sign it, both on the inside, where she inscribed over her heaving busoms “To sweet Brad…”, and on the cover where she inscribed her name and “Miss December 1968.”
I quickly rushed over to Hef and Dick and asked Dick if he’d grab Hef and pose for a photo with me. They both happily obliged. I printed this photo in my Dante’s Info #13 with the caption Dick Bann, author of Our Gang: The Life and Times of the Little Rascals, and Hugh Hefner, creator of Playboy: Two staples of every boy’s youth. Then I asked Hef to sign the Playboy as well and he did. This was the first time I met Hugh Hefner, the second would be two years later at the exact same place.
The autographs and celebrity encounters of Hollywood ’95 will continue…
Leave a Reply