Inside sinister Playboy ‘shadow mansions’: Daughter of Hugh Hefner’s best friend claims his powerful inner circle drugged, abused, and videoed women after luring them into copycat versions of his infamous home
- Jennifer Saginor, the daughter of Hefner’s personal physician and best friend Dr. Mark Saginor, shared details in the new episode of Secrets of Playboy
- She said several of Hefner’s close friends, including her own father, ran their own ‘mini mansions’ for Playmate castoffs
- Women were promised modeling careers if they moved in and convinced to pose nude for the men’s entertainment
- Saginor said videos were also taken which could be used as blackmail so women would remain in the ‘underground system’
- Wealthy men were given the opportunity to have sex with these women, and even Anna Nicole Smith was ‘on the menu
- Saginor said she was ‘horrified’ by what she saw, including ‘incoherent’ women being injected with drugs; she was even drugged by one of her dad’s friends
While countless abuses were allegedly occurring at the Playboy Mansion, members of Hugh Hefner’s inner circle were setting up their own ‘shadow mansions’ for the models who didn’t make it — and according to women who were there, the ‘predatory’ men who owned these homes staged fake photoshoots, promised made-up modeling contacts, and treated women like ‘cattle’ that were ‘on the menu.’
The latest episode of A&E’s series Secrets of Playboy takes a look back at these ‘shadow mansions,’ which became especially popular after Hefner married Kimberley Conrad in 1989 and hosted fewer orgy parties — so his friends filled in the gaps.
Jennifer Saginor, the daughter of Hefner’s personal physician and best friend Dr. Mark Saginor, recalled how her father turned his house into a Playboy Mansion ‘clone,’ and how she was ‘horrified’ by what she saw there.
Now 51, Saginor said many of the women were drugged and videotaped — which could be used as blackmail — and not even stars like Anna Nicole Smith were safe from being targeted.
Jennifer Saginor, the daughter of Hugh Hefner’s personal physician and best friend Dr. Mark Saginor, has shared startling revelations about ‘shadow mansions’ owned Hefner’s friends
Saginor is the daughter of Hugh Hefner’s former personal physician Dr. Mark Saginor, dubbed ‘Dr. Feelgood’ due to his propensity for dishing out prescription pills. She is pictured above with her dad, grandfather, and the infamous Playboy founder
‘My father and the inner circle from Playboy created clones of the Playboy Mansion on a smaller scale to sort of lure these young girls in,’ Saginor said in Monday’s episode.
‘It was very predatory. These young girls have no idea what’s gonna hit them next.
‘The competition is so stiff to be a Playmate, so [only a] handful makes it, [and] the rest slip through the cracks and get preyed on.’
While the women whom the men considered to be ‘nines or tens’ made it to the Playboy Mansion, the ‘sevens’ and eights’ went to the shadow mansions.
‘It became this predatory movement where the girls that didn’t make the cut at Playboy were really shuffled off into this underground system,’ she explained.
‘By shadow mansion, I mean that these men in Hef’s inner circle would try to emulate what he created in his own empire at the Playboy Mansion.
‘And they would have smaller versions of the Playboy Mansions, which I would refer to as mini mansions. They would house these young girls who would come to Los Angeles looking for opportunities to become actresses or models.
‘These scouts would invite these girls to these mini-mansions for these “modeling agency” parties and offer them a place to live and offer them modeling contracts,’ she recalled.
She said there were even ‘fake photoshoots’ where women ‘were posing without their clothes on’ — and she suspects they weren’t all able to consent.
‘I just remember walking in on them and being, like, horrified. These girls were clearly drugged and not coherent,’ she said.
‘Maybe they would also have somebody videotaping them, and then that videotape could be used as blackmail so they wouldn’t tell anyone or so that they’d sort of fall into this underground system of being available.
‘Basically, any powerful, wealthy man in Los Angeles who was on the guest list to attend the mini-mansion parties was given an opportunity to spend time with particular girls. “Spending time with her” is code for “having sex with her,”‘ she added.
‘I think many of the girls stayed in the mini-mansion system because they were scared of being blackmailed with videotapes.’
Her dad, nicknamed Dr. Feelgood because he was known to dish out prescription pills, turned his own home into one of these shadow mansions.
Saginor (pictured with the Playboy founder) recalled how women would be manipulated to move into these mini mansions, where they were treated like ‘cattle’
‘Any powerful, wealthy man in Los Angeles who was on the guest list to attend the mini-mansion parties was given an opportunity to spend time with particular girls,’ she said. Pictured is the mansion pool during the 2008 Guys Choice Awards after party
‘There were so many different young models living at my father’s house,’ she said. ‘[Hefner’s friends] would stop by my father’s house to sort of check out the cattle.’
In fact, according to Mansion West regular Jackie Hatten, even Anna Nichole Smith — 1993’s Playmate of the Year — was considered to be ‘on the menu’ for the men who showed up to one particular party.
‘I got the feeling when we were at the party that she was up for grabs for whoever,’ she said.
‘That’s how it works, even for someone like Anna Nicole Smith,’ Saginor added. ‘They’re used for a certain period of time, they are then easily disposable.’
Saginor eventually moved into her father’s mansion, where she would witness horrifying things and discover that even she wasn’t safe from the predatory behavior.
‘Once I moved into my father’s house, he had these different pictures of women on all fours, naked with a leash around the girl’s neck,’ Saginor said.
‘When I would try to say something to him, he was like, “Well they actually like to be submissive. They want to be dominated.”‘
‘Once I moved into my father’s house, he had these different pictures of women on all fours, naked with a leash around the girl’s neck,’ Saginor said
‘There were so many different young models living at my father’s house,’ she said. ‘[Hefner’s friends] would stop by my father’s house to sort of check out the cattle’
‘He was on drugs at the time and offering drugs to these young girls,’ she went on.
‘I remember walking into his bedroom and seeing these young girls really incoherent, and he would be injecting them with something. I grew up watching these girls come in looking one way and slowly becoming somebody that they probably don’t even recognize.’
While the Playboy Mansion parties were legendary, it was no secret that these shadow mansions existed.
‘I would see the same guys at the mini mansions that I would see at the Playboy Mansion,’ Rachel Myers, a Playboy Mansion West regular said. ‘So I think there was definitely a learned behavior from the Mansion to the mini mansions. These men got some ideas on how to manipulate women.’
She recalled that to get into one party, she allowed an older man to photograph her bare breasts, which she thought was ‘normal’ at the time because ‘there were photos on the table of multiple women.’
‘The experience I had at the mini-mansion parties is immediately walking in, having all the men glom on to you offering you, you know, lines of coke or a bowl of, you know, ecstasy. If you refuse those, they’re trying to shove champagne in your face — who knows what’s in the champagne, if they’ve dropped anything in there,’ added Playboy Mansion West regular Jackie Hatten.
Saginor (pictured with Hefner) said the men who owned the shadow mansions learned manipulative behavior from the Playboy Mansion
Saginor (pictured left in the mid-’80s) said even she wasn’t safe, recalling a friend of her father’s drugging her
Saginor (pictured alongside Jackie Hatten, left) admitted to feeling ‘devastating’ guilt that she didn’t help the other women
In addition to Dr. Mark Saginor, businessman Bernie Cornfeld also allegedly owned one of these shadow mansions, called Grayhall, which he’d lure women into by pretending to run a modeling agency.
‘Bernie, he would go prowling at night,’ said photographer Sharmagne Leland-St.John. ‘He’d go prowling up in the dormitory and be having sex with the girls up there. I realized that the modeling agency apparently fronted for Bernie’s sexual appetite. So, if you moved into the house, you became prey. You became one of his next conquests.’
The predatory atmosphere meant that even Saginor wasn’t protected.
‘As a teenager, I turned to one of my father’s friends for advice and showed up at his house. He ended up offering me a drink and putting something in my drink,’ she recalled.
‘Before I knew it, I was, you know, out of body and came to with him trying to have sex with me. Telling me I had to take my, like, clothes off, and I was in his bed, and the whole thing was so horrific.
‘For me, growing up in that setting, I was the only female that’s welcomed into this boys’ club. You know, I felt good about myself. I felt special and different. And really at the end of the day, I’m not.’
She also admitted to feeling ‘devastating’ guilt that she didn’t help the other women.
Daughter of Hugh Hefner’s ‘Dr. Feelgood’ describes growing up at the Playboy Mansion
Ruth Styles for DailyMail.com
From the age of six, Jennifer Saginor, now 51, spent her childhood at the infamous LA party spot and had a room of her own in the 29-bedroom mansion from the age of 12.
Now, Saginor tells DailyMail.com in an exclusive interview: ‘In my head, it was the most magical, Disneyland environment that a kid could ask for. I used to run into the game room and shove gumballs in my pocket.
‘I’d go to the Grotto and be watching people when they didn’t know I was there and swimming into the tunnel from the Grotto to the pool and just really, I just had so many different adventures.’
But, she explains, ‘as the years went on, I didn’t realize some of the boundaries being crossed by the adults would be something that would affect me for years to come.’
Saginor, who has written a memoir called Playground about her childhood, says Playboy boss Hugh Hefner was like an ‘uncle’ and would have his butlers cater to her every whim, whether a cheeseburger for lunch or a ride to school in the Playboy limo.
From the age of six, Jennifer Saginor, now 51, spent her childhood at the infamous LA party spot and had a room of her own in the 29-bedroom mansion from the age of 12
The reason was her father: Dr. Mark Saginor, Hefner’s personal physician and close friend who was nicknamed ‘Dr. Feelgood’ due to his propensity for dishing out prescription pills.
She describes how he encouraged Saginor and her sister to embrace nudity, took her clubbing at 15, and kept three jars filled with pills in the kitchen of the Beverly Hills family home labeled ‘uppers,’ ‘downers,’ and ‘quaaludes.’
But most of their time was spent at the mansion, exposing the glamorous blonde to shenanigans that included naked parties, parades of porn stars such as Ron Jeremy constantly in the home and big screen TVs that showed erotica on a loop.
Saginor is now set to star in a Netflix documentary due out in September detailing her unusual childhood at the mansion — and the addiction battle that followed after she became hooked on prescription meds in her teens.
Appearing in the documentary alongside Saginor will be Jackie Hatten, 48, who became a regular at the Playboy Mansion in the early 2000s thanks to her best friend: Anna Nicole Smith.
She revealed she now has ‘mixed feelings’ about the mansion due to the effect it had on her as a child (pictured)
Like Saginor, who made her final visit to the mansion in 2010 just before she entered rehab, Hatten describes a whirlwind of louche glamor, outrageous parties and catty competitiveness among the girls.
Saginor, who had a fling with one of Hefner’s girlfriends as a teenager, said there was always an element of competition but that it hit new heights during the noughties.
At the time, Hefner was dating Holly Madison, Kendra Wilkinson, and Bridget Marquardt, who later became famous thanks to E! reality show The Girls Next Door.
Although Saginor says she was allowed to do whatever she liked at the Mansion while growing up there, both women said Hefner’s harem of playmates were expected to follow the rules.
The rules, which were outlined in a contract signed by all of the playmates, included staying slim and agreeing to regular weigh-ins, abiding by a 9pm curfew, and a driving ban.
More arcane rules included avoiding eating cookies from a special jar that only Hef could touch and agreeing to sex with the Playboy supremo and his friends.
She recalled being exposed to nudity, sex, and Hefner’s harem of playmates, who she said would constantly compete for his attention
In exchange, the women were given an allowance of $1,000 a week.
Saginor and Hatten said the girls would jockey for position — all aiming to get closer to Hefner and the prize of becoming his number one girlfriend and sharing his bedroom.
Madison, in particular, became a pro at exploiting the rules and would regularly tell tales to Hefner about other girls who broke them.
‘Being Hef’s girlfriends in the inner circle, it was a competitive environment, catty, and I’m sure like being in a sorority in some ways,’ Saginor said.
‘It became a running joke that Holly was the narc. The narc that would narc on these other girls and get them in trouble if they for instance ate Hef’s personal cookies. He had these cookies that were just for him and no one was supposed to eat them.
‘Or when Kendra started dating Hank. She dated him for a few months and it was Holly who mentioned to Hef that Kendra was dating Hank.
‘Fortunately, Hef reacted in a positive way and Kendra was able to ask to have her wedding on the grounds which was unusual because usually, if someone broke a contract, they were thrown out.’
As a young girl, Saginor viewed the mansion as ‘the most magical, Disneyland environment that a kid could ask for’ and loved running into the game room (pictured) where she’d stuff her pockets with gumballs
Hatten tells another story about how she and three playmate friends were on a shoot in Malibu with noughties band Crazytown when one discovered she was being booted out of the Mansion after Madison told Hefner she had put a pair of his famous satin pajamas on Ebay.
‘Regina got a call saying she had been told on by Holly for taking some of Hef’s PJs, the satin PJs, so she got in trouble and got diced out of the mix,’ she said.
‘That was one of the things everyone got so upset about — that Holly would get people in trouble by telling on them.’
Saginor revealed she was still hooked on drugs when she wrote her 2005 memoir, Playground
Both say they have happy memories of Hefner, who died in 2017, and the wild parties he famously threw.
Hatten said: ‘The mansion was always super-fun, a lot of different interesting people and I was in the industry too, so I had a lot in common with many of them.’
Saginor added: ‘Living in the Playboy Mansion, for sure it was a very glamorous, fast paced lifestyle.
‘There was lots of drugs, lots of glitter and women and fun parties. Of course, there was a lot of sex. It was a hedonistic environment.
‘Holly and Kendra came on the scene and they were active participants, along with a lot of other women. These are willing participants, of course. Nobody was forcing them to do anything.
‘This was a free, fun loving other environment and if not, there’s the door. There were a million Hollys waiting to take her place.’
For her own part, Saginor has mixed memories of her upbringing and says a Playboy Mansion childhood is not what she would choose for her own child.
In 2005, she wrote a book called Playground about her childhood and says she now has a more clear-headed perspective on Mansion life than she did then.
She also described the catty competitiveness among the Playmates, revealing Holly Madison (pictured second from left in 2004) would commonly snitch on the other girls
She said: ‘The way I feel about Hef today is very different from how I felt growing up or even when I wrote the book because I wasn’t sober, I wasn’t clear-headed.
‘Even today, it’s still taking me a long time to understand that this environment that had no boundaries wasn’t healthy or typical for a woman who wants to feel good about herself or support other women.
‘It just wasn’t that kind of place. I don’t blame Hef for the environment he created because the rules were very clear – they were set forth in a contract from the beginning.’
The author added: ‘The way I saw Hef was as an uncle, as a second father figure. He was always very kind to me, very generous.
‘I had a room there and he encouraged me to see the mansion as a second home and for that I’m very grateful.
‘As I grew up into my teens, of course that was the only world I ever knew. For me, I think now having some perspective, I can see some of the situations weren’t appropriate for a child but at the time I didn’t know any different.’
Source: Read Full Article
