Ever heard about a really good opportunity and deal only to realize that not everything is as it’s been sold? In 1963, an ad promised “attractive young girls” a chance to make between $200 and $300 a week. Now, that might not sound like much, but back then, this translated to somewhere between $1,588.37 and $2,382.55 of today’s cash. That doesn’t sound too bad, doesn’t it? Except that the business looking for these young women was in fact the Playboy Club.
This was still during the early stages of the second wave of feminism and amidst the dawn of the sexual revolution. However, Hugh Hefner’s magazine had somehow taken the reigns of what this liberation meant. While this new perspective on human sexuality went against the values from the fifties, that had somehow been carried through since the Victorian era, the Playboy enterprise was still an ideology based on division of the sexes. Simone de Beauvoir had already published The Second Sex, and yet women were still treated as assets. Apparently the revolution was only intended for male satisfaction and freedom.
Then, in 1963, Gloria Steinem, who would become one of the most important voices in the fight for gender equality, went undercover into a Playboy Club. In an exposé for Show Magazine, she told her entire story from her casting to different bizarre moments and experiences as a Bunny. What’s interesting is that, while it’s been said and said how this was a journalistic endeavor, over fifty years later she is still introduced or referred to as Playboy Bunny. I’m still weary of whether this is done with the intention to discredit her activist work or because some people do find it fascinating.
The article starts with the newspaper ad, which aside from the promised paycheck also stated:
If you are pretty and personable, between 21 and 24, married or single, you probably qualify. No experience necessary.
(…)
Apply in person at SPECIAL INTERVIEWS being held Saturday and Sunday January 26-27, 10 A.M. – 3 P.M. Please bring a swimsuit or leotards.
Steinem went to the interview, using a family name instead of her own and creating an entire backstory for her alias. During a conversation with another Bunny in charge of her training and fitting, Steinem attempted to talk about her character’s name but is told, “We don’t like our girls to have any background. We just want you to fit the Bunny Image.”
This image included an outfit that was fitted to the point where a sneeze would break the zipper and the boning left plenty of the women complaining of their legs being numb. She also quickly found out that the paycheck would end up with plenty of deductions:
“I learned that they were not allowed to take their costumes out of the building and that each girl was supposed to pay $2.50 a day to cover the cost her costume’s upkeep and cleaning. Bunnies also paid $5 a pair for their thin black nylon tights and could be given demerits if they wore tights with runs on them.”
Among some of the important parts of becoming a Bunny was having to take a physical exam with a doctor that had an agreement with the Club. A blood test was taken, as well as a Wasserman Test for Syphillis, and a pap smear. When Steinem asks the doctor what would happen if she refused this invasive and legally unnecessary requirement in order to be a waitress, the physician simply tells her she won’t get the job.
Then she finds out how the tipping situation works. This is around the time where the Club became open for non-members as well. The Bunnies apparently preferred them to Club members, since cash tips are the only kind they could keep to themselves. Otherwise, “The Club takes 50 percent of the first $30 worth of those that are charged, 25 percent of amounts up to $60 and 5 percent after that.”
Steinem then worked at the coat check as well as at the tables. However, when she quit she was only paid for two of three days, since her first eight hours were called training. On her first night one of the other Bunnies warns, “And if anybody tries to pull your tail, just report him to the Room Director.” Yet, aside from her tail being pulled anyway, there are plenty of attempts and comments from the customers, who saw the Bunnies as objects rather than women trying to make a living.
Steinem observed how on the first night working at the club, she left through the employee exit and a cab driver offered her $4 to have sex with her, simply for working there. I think that what this exposé provided was an insight into the inequalities of a male-dominated society that was enjoying the sexual revolution for themselves, but only wanted women to be secondary participants. If a woman had opened the opposite of Playboy, say a club were shirtless men were handing out the drinks to rich women, it would’ve been a scene. But instead, this continued for several years. These clubs still exist today; however, I hope they are better regulated in terms of employee treatment.
It’s unfair for Steinem to be diminished by detractors who use her undercover work as a way to objectify her. Yet we can’t deny that this piece is an incredible insight into the way women were treated during the sexual revolution but prior to the second wave of feminism. It shows us the double standards others tend to gloss over and reminds us why we need to continue pushing for gender equality on all fronts to this day.
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