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"| have profiled plenty of athletes who were nightmares, but 
Chuck Liddell was a hell of a guy," says Lucius Shepard, who 
literally sat in Liddell's passenger seat for The Iceman Cleans 
Up, a personal look at the UFC's toughest competitor. “He even 
picked me up and drove me wherever | needed to go. He is very 
engaging and egalitarian; his trainer says he speaks to every- 
body the same way, whether they are a CEO or a bum on the 
street." Liddell's demeanor is not unusual for a UFC fighter. "The 
misperception may be that they are all goons, but | have yet to 
meet an asshole in the sport. The fighters are relatively sophisti- 
cated. Most of them wrestled, and unlike boxers or baseball 
players the natural progression for wrestlers is to go on to col- 
lege. Liddell has an accounting degree from Cal Poly. If fighting 
hadn't worked out, he could have been punching numbers." 


This month's fiction is The Gunderson Prophecy, by Sam 
Lipsyte. It's the story of a New Ager who discovers through 
drugs that the apocalypse is happening right now. What would 
the author do if he knew doomsday were today? “I'm not sure," 
Lipsyte answers. “I have this thing about my footwear, though. 
Whenever | leave my apartment | check to see that my shoes 
are sturdy enough to get me through the shit. Of course, I'm 
sure that if I'm wearing durable footwear during the apocalypse, 
somebody will shoot me for my boots. There's no winning." 


When Kimberly Bell met Barry 
Bonds all she wanted was some- 
one to love and protect her; the 
idea that she would be swept up 
in the greatest sports scandal of 
the era was beyond imagining. In 
the article accompanying her pic- 
torial, The Bonds Girl, Bell tells 
Steve Pond about the ups and 
too frequent downs of dating the 
home-run king. "She isn't so 
much a woman with an ax to 
grind as a woman who was hurt," 
Pond says. "She is surprised by 
the life she has had. She didn't 
seem like a sports groupie by 
any means but a nice girl with a 
decent job who just happened to 
meet the wrong guy." Pond 
asked Bell about Bonds's new 
record. She said she hadn't 
watched a game for some time. 


Combine the coolness of 
"Broadway Joe" Namath with 
the humility of Joe Montana 
and you have our 20Q subject, 
Matt Leinart. The Arizona Car- 
dinals signal caller, who can 
be found in as many tabloids 
as sports magazines, spoke 
with Jason Buhrmester about 
being addicted to video games 
and which actresses he would 
like to date. “Не has a lax 
Hollywood-quarterback image 
from hanging out in clubs with 
celebrities," Buhrmester says. 
"Some say such conduct will 
hurt his career, but as he notes, 
he behaved the same way in 
college and look at his record: 
two national championships 
and a Heisman Trophy." 


How the mighty have fallen. Six months ago Paul Wolfowitz was 
president of the World Bank and one of the most powerful men 
on the planet. In The Passion of Paul Wolfowitz, James Rosen, 
author of The Strong Man, looks at how Wolfowitz, shadowed by 
the Iraq war, was pushed out the door for allegedly bending the 
rules for his girlfriend. "There was a pretext for scandal, but it 
wasn't what fueled his ouster," Rosen says. "It is an amazing 
story of the Washington scandal culture at work, and as Henry 
Kissinger would say, it has the added benefit of being true." 


vol. 54, no. 11—november 2007 


PLAYBOY 


features 


60 THE PASSION OF PAUL WOLFOWITZ 
As president of the World Bank, Paul Wolfowitz was one of the most powerful 
men on earth. But long before his term expired, he was—quite diplomatically— 
shown the door. Here is the inside story of how Wolfowitz's enemies used his 
relationship with his girlfriend to drive him out. BY JAMES ROSEN 


70 THE SEXUAL MALE, PART THREE: SEX ON THE BRAIN 
In the third installment in our ongoing series of reports on the science of male 
sexuality, we examine your most important sex organ and its ability to turn you 
on, turn you off and turn you into a fool for love. BY CHIP ROWE 


76 GENIUSES AT PLAY 
The video game is an art form with limitless variations. We spoke with some of 
the industry's foremost creators, who told us where video games are headed and 
why they arouse so much passion. BY SCOTT ALEXANDER 


96 STRAIGHT TALK EXPRESSED 
Two years before jumping into the presidential primary race, Fred Thompson, 
the former senator and appealing character actor, sat down with the veteran 
CBS political analyst and author to talk about how politicians talk—and why 
voters are hungry for an honest human voice. BY JEFF GREENFIELD 


104 THE ICEMAN CLEANS UP 
Win or lose, Chuck Liddell is the biggest celebrity in the UFC. No fighter draws 
larger crowds, and he's certainly the only one to star on an episode of Entourage. 
Our writer watches the Iceman train and play with his kids and listens to his 
tales of life in the Octagon and the fast lane, BY LUCIUS SHEPARD 


fiction 


108 THE GUNDERSON PROPHECY 
The apocalypse is upon us—so says a pre-Columbian codex, according to 
Gunderson, a DMT-driven New Age prophet awash in TV offers and fresh 
hippie tang. All he has to do is stay one step ahead of the cosmic blues 
before popular belief—and easy cash—runs out. BY SAM LIPSYTE 


the playboy forum 
COVER STORY 


43 WHY DON'T LIBERALS DREAM? я > К 
The left believes that "the truth shall make you free,” but the truth reveals _ 770 
itself only by being told. If they want to sway the masses, Democrats need to grounds, the Playboy Bunny has become a 
understand the place of spectacle in politics. BY STEPHEN DUNCOMBE timeless cultural icon. Now the Playboy Club 
is back, along with a new crop of Bunnies, at 
the Palms in Las Vegas. Senior Contributing 


20Q Photographer Arny Freytag helps Bunny 
Ир Lindsey Roeper hop onto our cover; our 
74 MATT LEINART Rabbit loves a woman in uniform. 


Would you choose voluntary football practice over a day with Scarlett Johansson? 
The Arizona Cardinals QB comes to the sidelines to discuss this difficult choice, 
as well as the pleasures of hanging with Will Ferrell, his worst hangover and why 
he delayed entering the NFL to finish at USC. BY JASON BUHRMESTER 


interview 


49 ROBERT REDFORD 
Though a Hollywood star for four decades, the intensely private actor-activist remains 
something of a mystery. As his charged political thriller Lions for Lambs prepares to 
open, the Oscar-winning director chats candidly about getting older, avoiding scandal 
and why he found it difficult to shake President Bush's hand. BY DAVID HOCHMAN 


vol. 54, no. 11 —november 2007 


PLAYBOY 


64 


82 


110 


n 


12 


143 


pictorials 


THE BONDS GIRL 

In this grand slam of a pictorial, 
Kimberly Bell proves there is life 
after a tumultuous relationship 
with Barry Bonds. 


PLAYMATE: 

LINDSAY WAGNER 

Miss November may not be the 
Bionic Woman, but this 
Cornhusker is a knockout both 
in and out of the ring. 


THE BUNNIES ARE BACK 

At the Playboy Club at the Palms 
in Las Vegas, some extraordinary 
women are reviving the Bunny 
tradition. Meet the new breed. 


notes and news 


THE WORLD OF PLAYBOY 
Jenny McCarthy becomes the 
first celebrity dealer at the 
Las Vegas Playboy Club; at the 
Mansion, the Nicole Brown 
Foundation raises awareness 
about domestic violence. 


FUN IN THE SUN AND 
FIREWORKS 

Celebrities such as Michael Bay, 
Joanie Laurer, Too Short and Bill 
Maher set it off at the Mansion 
on Independence Day. 


PLAYMATE NEWS 

Playmate Kara Monaco follows 
unrelated Playmate Kelly Monaco 
into the emotionally fraught world 
of daytime drama; Miss November 
2001 Lindsey Vuolo goes Greek 
for her master's degree. 


departments 


PLAYBILL 
DEAR PLAYBOY 


19 AFTER HOURS 

27 REVIEWS 

33 MANTRACK 

39 THE PLAYBOY ADVISOR 
94 PARTY JOKES 

127 WHERE AND HOW TO BUY 
148 GRAPEVINE 

150 POTPOURRI 


fashion 


100 COAT CHECK 


Outerwear goes anywhere 
when we pull out these stylish 
coats and jackets designed 

to ward off the big chill. 

BY JOSEPH DE ACETIS 


this month on playboy.com 


MAGAZINE BLOG 
News, views and inside perspectives 
from PLAYBOY editors. playboy.com/blog 


20G REVIEW 

From Arafat to Zappa, lose yourself 
perusing our archive of 20Q 
interviews. playboy.com/20q 


PLAYBOY U 

Matriculate Mansion-style at 

our collegian-only social network. 
playboy.com/pbu 


THE 21ST QUESTION 
Cards quarterback Matt 
Leinart calls one more play. 
playboy.com/21q 


DUDS STUDS 
We name America's 
10 best men's 
clothing bou- 
tiques. playboy 
.comvalist 


GENERAL OFFICES: PLAYBOY, 680 NORTH LAKE SHORE Ойуу, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS 60611. PLAYBOY AGGUMES NO RESPONSIBILITY 
TO METURN UNSOLICITED EDITOMIAL OM GRAPHIC OF OTHER MATERIAL ALL MONTO IN LETTERS AND UNSOLICITED EDITORIAL AND 


OMAPHIG MATERIAL WILL ФЕ TREATED AS UNCONDITIONALLY ASSIGNED гот PUBLICATION AND COPYRIGHT PURPOSES AND MATERIAL. 
WILL UK BUBJEGT TO FLATOOTS UNMERTMIGTED NIGHT TO EDIT AND TO COMMENT EDITOMIALAY. PLAY@OY, DATE OF PRODUCTION 
AUGUST 2007. CUSTODIAN Of RECORDOS I DEM TAYLOR, ALL RECORDS NEQUINED BY LAW TO BE MAINTAINED OY PUSLISHEA ANE 
LOCATED AY 600 NORTH LAKE SHORE ORIVE, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS 00011. CONTENTS COPYRIGHT © 200? BY PLAYBOY. ALL RIGHTS 
RESERVED. PLAYBOY, PLAYMATE AND RABBIT HEAD SYMBOL ARE MARKS OF PLAYBOY, REGISTERED U.S. TRADEMARK OFFICE NO 
PART OF ТМ BOOK MAY BE REPRODUCED. STORED IN A RETRIEVAL OYGTEM ON TRANSMITTED IN ANY FORM BY ANY ELECTRONIC, 
MECHANICAL, PHOTOCOPYING OF ACCORDING MEANS OR OTHERWISE WITHOUT PRIOR WHITTEN PERMISSION OF THE PUBLISHER. ANY 
BIMILAMITY OETWEEM THE PEOPLE AND PLACES IM THE FICTION AND GEMIFICTION IN THIS MAGAZINE AND ANY MEAL PEOPLE AND 
PLACES iS PURELY COINCIDENTAL, FON EHKOITE BEE PAGE 127. DANBURY MINT ОМВЕЯТ IN DOMESTIC SUBSCRIPTION POLYWRAPFEO 
COPIER, SANTA FE INSERT BETWEEN PAGES 24-25 AND CROWN ROYAL INGEST BETWEEN PAGES 36-3? IN DOMESTIC NEWSSTAND Амо 
SUBSCRIPTION COMES. MILLER INGERT AND MIDDLETON INSERT BETWEEN PAGES 130-13! IN SELECTED DOMESTIC NEWSSTAND AND 
SUBSCRIPTION COMES. CERTIFICADO DE LICITUD ОЕ TITULO MO. 7570 DE FECHA 29 DE JULIO OE 1992, Y CERTIFICADO DE LICITUD OK 
CONTENIDO МО 5100 DE FECHA 29 DK JULIO DE 1999 EXPEDIDOS FON LA COMIGION GALITIGADOMA DE PUBLICACIONES Y REVISTAS 
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PRINTED IN U.S.A. 


WHAT'S THE 
DEAL, JENNY? 
Here's a great way to 
ensure the house al- 
ways wins: Distract 
the players with a 
Centerfold in a Bun- 
ny costume. Even 
better, make it Jenny 
McCarthy. The 1994 
Playmate of the Year 
dealt blackjack for 
the Big Deal charity 
fund-raiser at the 
Playboy Club at the 
Palms in Las Vegas. 
To prep for her three 
hours at the table, 
Jenny was schooled 
in the art of dealing. 
Now hit me! 


PLAYBOY 


HEF SIGHTINGS, MANSION FROLICS AND NIGHTLIFE NOTES 


ANTE UP 
When the Sports Dream Celebrity Poker Tourna- * y 
ment was held at the Mansion, Hef and his ladies t - 
(left) found a full house of celebrities going down to { 
the river. Among them: Ricardo Antonio Chavira of ` 
^ Desperate Housewives (below, with Centerfolds) | |. 
i d and Shawn Marion (right) of the Phoenix Suns. i + 


NICOLE BROWN FOUNDATION 
Denise Brown (below right) held a benefit to end domestic violence for 
the Nicole Brown Foundation at the Mansion. Celebs like PLAYBOY cover 
girl Denise Richards (below left) helped raise awareness and funds. 


44 


PARTY ANIMALS 
Stars love pets. How do we know? Tori Spelling and Dean McDermott from Tori 


| АУ & Dean: Inn Love, and pooch (left), came out for the Bow Wow Wow fund-raiser 


to benefit Much Love Animal Rescue. They joined Cesar "the Dog Whisperer" 
Millan (below) at Hef's place, along with Haylie and Hilary Duff (below right), 
pictured with Hef's main squeeze, Holly Madison. 


SHOWSTOPPER 
I always complain to my husband 

that рглувоу doesn't feature enough 
women of color. Garcelle Beauvais- 
Nilon (La Belle Beauvais, August) will 
stop my bitching for a bit. Major cool 
points to you. Thanks again. 

Kelly Pettit 

Colorado Springs, Colorado 


Garcelle needs company. You busy? 


Beauvais-Nilon is the kind of woman 
who could make me steal from my job, 
leave my family and move to the moon 
if all she said was "Now!" I liked her on 
NYPD Blue, but I love her in PLAYBOY. 

Henry Zellman 
Rocklin, California 


My God, now there's a beauty! 
David Simmons 
Los Angeles, California 


I've been a playboy reader since my 
college days and have never seen a more 
captivating pictorial. My subscription 
will be renewed once again. 

Kelvinal Stumon 
Cedar Hill, Texas 


I know other black women have 
appeared in rraynov, but the stunning 
photos make Garcelle stand out. As a 
young black woman I feel good about 
my own body when I see another black 
woman proudly displaying hers, 

Codi Bean 
Charleston, West Virginia 


І always keep my magazines pristine, 
but when I saw page 109 I had to tear it 
out and put it on the wall. Wow. 

Will Mellon 
Toledo, Ohio 


P | a 


I enjoy rLAvBov and usually get to 
my husband's copy before he does. 
Garcelle quips that she hopes some- 
day to be able to show the photos to 
her grandkids, Many of your models 
say this type of thing. I would have 
freaked if Га found out that either of 
my grandmothers had posed. Your 
models should just admit it’s a huge 
ego boost, Nothing wrong with that. 

Teri Higgenbotham 
Madison, Alabama 


WINNING FICTION 
The August fiction by Jess Walter, 

We Live in Water, is nothing less than 

remarkable. As I read his extraordinary 

ending, I closed my eyes tightly to hold 

back the tears. The brilliant writing in 

PLAYROY never ceases to amaze me. 
Eugene Nadeau 
Warwick, Rhode Island 


Most people read your magazine for 
the articles, but not me: I look at the 
photos. I did read Walter's short story, 
though, and it was a good one. It could 
easily be a great novel. 

Kurt Shafer 
Chatsworth, Illinois 


ADDITIONS AND SUBTRACTIONS 

Because I have always preferred the 
girl next door, I am disappointed to 
see artificially enhanced breasts on the 
cute, alluring and tattoo- and piercing- 
free Tiffany Selby (Beach Blonde, July). 
Turn back a few pages to your Montauk 
Summer pictorial, in which the breasts 
are all certainly real. Speaking of all- 
natural, I'm glad you didn't throw 
away the pictures of Stacey Grenrock 
Woods ("Look What We Found," After 
Hours, July). If you have hundreds, 
show us more, 


Joe Hutchinson 
Glendale, Arizona 


Your August Playmate, Tamara Sky, 
is a beautiful woman, tattoos and all 
(Sky's the Limit). So it's disheartening to 
see that the tattoo on her lower back 
is visible on page 74 but airbrushed 
away on her Centerfold, especially 
since Tamara expresses an interest in 
graphic design. The tattoo is part of 
who she is. Also, tell Holly Madison— 
who produced the pictorial, as seen on 
The Girls Next Door—she did a great 
job on the drinks shown in the Center- 
fold, but there are usually three cher- 
ries in a hypnotic. It would also have 
added a lot to the photo if there were 
lipstick on the glass or if more of the 
drink were gone. Who goes to a club 
and orders drinks but doesn’t drink 


y b o y 


them? Ask Hef if he wants to hire me 
to help—it seems as if I'm the only one 
paying attention. 
Melinda Brown 
Charleston, South Carolina 
Did you notice Tamara is nude? We didn't 
remove her tattoo; it's obscured because of 


the angle of her pose and the lighting. 


Miss August is another Playmate 
with hips larger than her breasts. That 
makes, what, three this year? This trend 
is not the reason I subscribe to PLAYBOY. 
Perky doesn't do it for me. 

Lex Larsen 
Henderson, Nevada 

With nearly 10 million readers each month, 

we have never pleased all of them at once. 


CHRIS TUCKER RETURNS 
Thank you for the fascinating Playboy 
Interview with Chris Tucker (August). I 
can't count the times I've read about 
a celebrity and thought, Why can't he 
use his fame and fortune to educate 
and enrich himself and travel? How 
can people with so many opportuni- 
ties appear to be so stupid and shallow? 
Tucker is a notable exception. 
Sera Day 
Tustin, California 


How could Tucker not include Bob 
Hope and Bing Crosby, Jack Lemmon 


After six years away Tucker opens up. 


and Walter Matthau or Paul Newman 
and Robert Redford in his list of top 
Hollywood movie buddies? 
Bryan Boer 
Pacifica, California 


Tucker strikes me as an intelligent man 
with a creative edge—a rare find. But I 


15 


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Introducing the fine line of tequila: 


plata, reposado and anejo. 


100% PURO DE AGAVE. 


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DRINK RESPONSIBLY. 


am disappointed by the way you always 
seem to conduct interviews with people 
who happen to have a dark complexion. 
Why is it that journalists feel compelled 


to ask about the subject's experience of 


being black? I have yet to see an inter- 
view with a white celebrity in which the 
issue of racism comes up. 
Scott Davis 
Providence, Rhode Island 
You must have missed our interview with 
Steve Nash in May. 


THE MISSING 40 
In The Open Road (July), you write, 
"Forty years have passed since A. J. 
Foyt and Dan Gurney's historic ‘all- 
American’ Le Mans victory in a car 
called—you guessed it—the Ford GT." 
Actually, the car that won in 1967 was a 
Ford GT40 MK IV, chassis number J6. 
To a racing aficionado, there is a huge 
difference. In 2002 Ford announced 
its intention to reintroduce the GT40, 
but the company no longer owned the 
trademark, so Ford called it just the GT. 
The GT40 is а race car of the 1960s; 
the GT is a street car of the 2000s. The 
Ford GT40 won at Le Mans in 1967. 
Abby Remley 
Union, Kentucky 


BURNING RUBBER AND GREASE 
I enjoyed Seamus McGraw's article 
on greasy fueling (The Greasecar War, 
August). I own a modified 1978 3000 
Mercedes-Benz diesel that burns a 
mixture of mostly canola and olive 
oils purchased wholesale for $1 a gal- 
lon. The Germans built these engines 
to last forever—a design concept that 
includes an awareness of petroleum's 
finite future. As with many technolo- 
gies, there is more to a greasecar 
than feel-good marketers let on. For 
instance, the old story that Rudolph 
Diesel ran his first engine on peanut 
oil is true, but he also made use of the 
most available fuels of the day, most 
notably coal dust. In addition to vio- 
lating the Clean Air Act, folks who fuel 
their rides with vegetable oils or home- 
brewed biodiesel are liable for motor- 
fuel taxes. Finally, most states require 
you to be a licensed waste hauler to 
carry away restaurant grease. All that 
said, many exciting advances have 
been made, such as in synthetic die- 
sel fuel made from biomass (sawdust, 
wood scraps, rice husks, cattle bone- 
meal, railway ties). I read one article 
in which a Shell executive is quoted 
as saying of a brand of biofuel, “You 
can drink it. You won't feel great, but 
you won't die." I can't wait for that ad 
campaign. Synthetic diesel, which is 
already used in Europe, will make its 
way to the U.S. soon enough. 
Patrick Kennedy 
Oakland, California 


It's great to see the grease-fuel move- 
ment getting coverage in major publica- 
tions such as PLAYBOY. It's odd, though, 
to characterize it as a "war," because 
everyone seems to be on the same side. 
Five years ago I started Grease Not 
Gas (greasenotgas.com) and have since 
driven across the U.S. 16 times without 
paying for fuel. Recycling some of the 
4 billion gallons of grease produced in 
the U.S, each year is probably the most 
ethical way you can get around. 

Mike Parziale 
Portland, Oregon 


McGraw's commentary on biodie- 
sel seems a bit snarky. It's laughable to 
compare the biodiesel industry to big oil. 
Virtually every one of the 148 biodiesel 
plants in the U.S. is a small business, and 
every one is good for our nation's energy 
security. They're increasing our capacity 
to produce fuel, and they are in diverse 
locations not vulnerable to hurricanes 
and attacks. McGraw also fails to men- 
tion that the auto industry has started 
to embrace cleaner-burning biodiesel. 
Chrysler and GM now support blends 


A little grease can go a long way. 


of 20 percent biodiesel (B20) for some of 
their models. Other engine makers, such 
as Cummins, support B20 across the 
board. Sure, biodiesel is not vet available 
at every gas station, but if more people 
choose fuel-effiaent diesel vehicles and 
demand biodiesel for them, the market 
will respond. Besides, how practical is it 
to fill your weekends collecting grease, 
then spend thousands of dollars alter- 
ing your Mercedes, only to send it over 
a cliff, as McGraw did? 

Jenna Higgins 

National Biodiesel Board 

Jefferson City, Missouri 


Read more feedback at playboy.com/blog. 


E-mail via the web at LETTERS.PLAYBOY.COM Or write: 730 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK, NEW YORK 10019 


| babes of the month 


The Olly 
Girls 


Holly Huddleston and Molly 
Shea, better known as the Olly 
Girls from the E! reality show 
Sunset Tan, are not twins, sis- 
ters or cousins. “We both have 
blonde hair and blue eyes, but 
we don't look anything alike,” 
says Molly (right), who despite 
her protests does look quite a 
bit like Holly. “I'm an inch or 
two taller than Holly, and I'm 
whiter.” On Sunset Tan the 
Ollies’ misadventures provide 
ditsy comic relief from the stan- 
dard reality-TV power struggles. 
Currently they're dishing on 
the NFL as the hosts of Perfect 
Picks, a weekly sports show on 
KushTV.com. JB and Howie 
they ain't: Their commentary is 
broken up with reenactments 
of classic end-zone dances (the 
Ickey shuffle, anyone?), as well 
as lap dances administered as 
"punishment" for bad predic- 
tions. The football connection 
is apt, however, since the two 
met at a photo shoot for the 
2007 Lingerie Bowl. Alas, that 
event was canceled, so the 
Ollies never got the chance to 
take the field as Dallas Desire 
teammates. But they've been 
living under the same roof ever 
since. "We slept in the same 
bed for five months," Molly 
says playfully, although she 
will neither confirm nor deny 
that there was any messing 
around. They're comfortable in 
their own skin, though, as their 
neighbors may confirm. "We 
walk around our house naked 
all the time," says Holly. Then 
Molly chimes in, "We're always 
cooking breakfast naked. 
That's normal for us." 


ЕГ 


PHOTOGRAPHY BY МІКЕ PRADO 


| afterhours 


HEYS PULL ІТ NT > 
^ SUPERMAN MIGHT = 
FLY BY... АМО „/" 

STEAL MY PANTS J. 7, 
I'M.. * 


Admit it—you've always wanted to see Wonder Woman naked. The 
above sketch, by original W.W. artist H.G. Peter, is just one of the trea- 
sures to be found in Clean Cartoonists' Dirty Drawings, by Craig Yoe. 


not-so-instant karma 


His Name Is Greg, Not Earl 
THE TRUE CONFESSIONS OF A GUILT-RACKED SITCOM CREATOR 


It's no coincidence that the sitcom My Name Is Ear! deals in 
repentance and redemption: Its creator, Greg Garcia, has a few 
wrongs in his own past he'd like to right or at least acknowledge. 
"| just want to sleep at night with a clear conscience," he says, 
"with no snakes in my head." Let the healing begin. 

1. “In kindergarten | organized what | called the ‘bathroom 
Olympics.’ Two other boys and I tried see how high up the wall 
we could pee. | would like to apologize to the janitor who had to 
clean it up. Sadly, | walked away with only a bronze medal." 

2. "In high school | was trying to light a Joint while driving my 
parents' car, when | veered onto the median and smashed the 
driver's-side mirror against a sign. Not wanting to get into trouble, 
| parked the car on the street in front of our house and hoped my 
dad would think someone driving by had sideswiped it. The ruse 
wouldn't work without broken glass on the ground, so | ran down 
the street, smashed the mirror on someone's VW bug, collected 
the glass and scattered it by my father's car. He bought it." 


3. "In 1987 | ruined my high school's production of Grease by 


The Things They Carried 


THOSE WHO WERE THERE COULD READ 
THE WRITING ON THE LIGHTERS 


For American soldiers in 
Vietnam, the Zippo lighter 
was an essential talisman; 
its chrome casing was also a 
convenient canvas on which 
fighters expressed their 
anger and frustration. In 
Vietnam Zippos, edited by 
Sherry Buchanan, these 
unique artifacts tell the 
story of a war gone sour. 
Lyndon Johnson's observa- 
tion that "ultimate victory 
will depend upon the hearts 
and minds of the people" 
inspired the gleeful savagery 
of "Give me your hearts and 
minds or | will wreck your 
fucking huts" (top); another 
soldier rephrases Psalm 23 
with "Yea though | walk 
through the valley of the 
jungle of death, I will fear 
no evil, for | am the evilest 
son of a bitch in the jungle" 
(middle). Later, as enthusi- 
asm for the war ebbed, 
lighters feature such deep 
thoughts as "When the 
power of love is as strong as 
the love of power, then there 
will be peace" (bottom). 
Truer words were never 
engraved above a rabbit 
caressing a huge erection. 


releasing 30 mice in the auditorium. | invite the cast and crew to 
contact me in L.A.; I'll take you all to dinner." 

4. "| once worked in a real estate office, and | attempted to make 
a Xerox copy of my naked ass. | took my pants down and jumped 
onto the copy machine, breaking it almost immediately. Hours 
later one of the brokers tried to make a copy. The machine didn't 
work, so she opened it to clear the jam and pulled out a piece of 
paper with my ass on it. I'm sorry that lady had to see that." 


(4a. "| also stole $20 worth of stamps from that office to enter 
an MTV contest. The prize was a backyard barbecue with Motley 
Crue. | didn't win. | now live in the same neighborhood as Nikki 
Sixx—1 could have him over for burgers and pretend | won.") 

5. "In college | borrowed Jen Ryland's beat-up Chevette to go to 
a party where | almost got into a fistfight with Eddie Money, 
though that's not what I'm sorry about. On the way home, the 
Chevette's clutch blew; I left the car on the side of the road and 
hitchhiked back to school. Jen Ryland never saw her car again. 
Jen, if you read this, call me at NBC." 


22 


| afterhours 


coed of the month 


Nittany Lioness 


ТАТЕ > GRES 


PLAYBOY: What's the best thing about attending Penn State? 

IMBERLEE: The campus is big and everybody is friendly. | love 
meeting new people, and with such a huge student body at the 
main campus, you can meet someone new every day. 
PLAYBOY: Sounds like you have strong social skills. 

BERLEE: Yes. My major is public relations. When | gradu- 
ate | want to do PR for a Vegas hotel—or perhaps Playboy. 
PLAYBOY: When can we expect your résumé? 

RLEE: I'm a junior now, so spring 2009. 
PLAYBOY: You'll need to know a lot about entertainment for 
men: naked women, sports... 

IBERLEE: | love football, especially Nittany Lions football. 
The tailgating is insane. We start on Friday night and go 


strong into Saturday-afternoon game time. 
PLAYBOY: Have you talked to Joe Paterno? 


Е: Yes, When | met JoePa he smiled at me and 
gave me a huge hug. 
PLAYBOY: Does he hang out near the dorms? 

IMBERLEE: | don't know. | moved off campus because | couldn't 
bring a guy back to the dorm if my roommate was there. 
PLAYBOY: You just have to be creative. Ever tried the library? 

: No, we don't do it in the library at Penn State. But 
we have a big Nittany Lion statue on campus—I’d love to have 
sex on that someday. 


Want to be the next Coed of the Month? Learn how to apply at playboy.com/pose 


The Sexy Philip Seymour Hoffman 


COMEDIAN JIM GAFFIGAN IS A TEDDY BEAR. 
A BIG ALBINO TEDDY BEAR 


How white are you? | just found out I'm too white to be 
a Mormon. Who wins in a white-off, you or Conan 
O'Brien? You never win when you're this pale. How do 
you feel when people call you the funny Philip Seymour 
Hoffman? 1 think if you read between the lines, they're 
really saying I'm the sexy Philip Seymour Hoffman. Most 
of your act is about being white; why is the rest about 
food? You could have bought my other CD. Thanks for 
doing the research. /f you were skinny and black, what 
would you tell jokes about? My experience on America's 
Next Top Model. What's the funniest food? Food is not 
funny; human feelings toward food are funny. Wait, I 
guess Hot Pockets are funny. How many Hot Pockets 
could you eat in one sitting? A half. No, one bite. Actu- 
ally, just looking at the box makes me a little queasy. 
What are the most kick-ass Hot Pockets? They introduce 
a new one every eight minutes—1 have trouble keeping 
up. I'm waiting for the Hot Pockets cologne. What's your 
favorite fast-food item? That depends on where | am. In 
northwest Indiana it's Schoop's Hamburgers; in Wiscon- 
sin, Kopp's Frozen Custard. What's your favorite holiday 
tradition? Whoever invented mistletoe was a brilliant 
creep. What's the worst birthday gift you've ever received? 
When | was seven | got a package of hot dogs and some 
Dr Pepper. | loved it, which says a lot about me. What's 
the worst birthday gift you've ever given? | gave my wife 
a broom. That backfired. Have you ever belonged to a 
cult? l'm still on AOL, yes. Are we done here? Yes. Good. 
The first round's on us. What are you drinking? Gravy. 


Jim Gaffigan's latest project is Pale Force, an animated 
series now showing on NBC.com. 


bubblesllcloun s 


She Can 
Leave 
This 

Hat On 

A TIP OF THE 
OLD-SCHOOL 
CAP FROM 
ONE OF OUR 
FAVORITE 
STARLETS 


What beats Lind- 

say Lohan taking 

a bubble bath? 

Arguably nothing, 

but when we spot- 

ted this photo in 

Los Angeles Confi- 

dential magazine 

we had to admit the vintage Playboy Club doorman's hat was 
a nice garnish. Hef himself was quite pleased to see the 
classic lid on such a classic beauty—but offered a gentle 
criticism for the magazine's researchers. The caption iden- 
tifies the hat as being from the 1950s; Hef says it's а 
1960s model. Come on, guys, give us a call next time. 


| elsewhere at playboy 


cock-a-doodle-doo 


Teats and Ass 
OVERALLS-OPTIONAL FARMING 


We don't need to explain Playboy TV's 
Hot Babes Doing Stuff Naked, do we? The 
babes are hot; they do stuff naked. Special 
Editions model Erika Jordan tells us about 
her adventures in bamyard nudity. 


Playboy: Hello, hot babe. What stuff did 
you do naked? 

Erika: | got to milk a cow, chase chickens 
and ride a mechanical bull. 


Playboy: Did riding the bull leave you 
black-and-blue in intimate areas? 

Erika: No. The trick is to stick your pelvis 
out so your girlie parts don't actually hit 
the saddle. | have a big butt—in a good 
way—so | tried to use it as a cushion. The 
next day, | woke up feeling as if I'd had a 
good spanking. 

Playboy: Is that an unfamiliar feeling? 
Erika: Not really. | like it rough. 

Playboy: Did you catch any chickens? 
Erika: | grabbed one and she went com- 
pletely still, not even blinking. She was 
sticking her tail feathers up, waiting for 
something. The farmer explained to me 
that she was in heat. 

Playboy: She thought you were a rooster? 
Erika: Yeah. | don't see the similarity. 
Playboy: How was milking the cow? 

Erika: The cow was unhappy. | guess she 
was used to the machines, as opposed to a 
person. | know how it is: I've been single so 
long, I'm used to the machines too. 
Playboy: Do you have any milking tips? 
Erika: Squeeze hard. And it's like with a 
man—you gotta get the motion right. 
Playboy: As you were doing it, were you 
thinking, Hey, I've done this before? 
Erika: Totally. It was just like that, minus 
the facial at the end. 


Hot Babes Doing Stuff Naked is part of 
Playboy TV's Playboy Prime programming, 
airing nightly from eight to 11 P.M., EST. 


grow your own 


Carrat Ctacha PS 
sec! се асте 1 N 


Why is this Rabbit wear- 
ing a mustache? Because 
it's not just November on 
college campuses—it's 
Movember. Growing a lip 
brow for charity could get 
you into Playboy events 
or win you Playboy gear. 
For more information visit 
playboyu.com/movember, 


brushing up 


PL?“ ЧО 


Masterpiece 


WE DON'T KNOW IF IT'S ART, BUT 
IT'LL LOOK GOOD ON YOUR PHONE 


The March 1968 issue of pLarsor featured 
an interview with Truman Capote, fiction by 
Italo Calvino and an attack on apathetic 
American liberals from British critic Ken- 
neth Tynan. All this and a cover pictorial by 
Mario Casilli called The Provocative Art of 
Body Painting. At the time, Senior Art 
Director Chet Suski (who did not work on 
this cover) was painting women for parties 
at the Playboy Mansion in Chicago. "Psy- 
chedelic art was very trendy," he says. 
"Paint-by-number kits were popular as well, 
and there's an element of that in this cover. 
Body painting was a new phenomenon, and 
it was done freehand. | remember being 
really nervous. There | was, in my 20$, 
painting models at the Mansion and Bun- 
nies at the Playboy Club. Every guy wanted 
to change jobs with me." This cover and 
other classics are available as wallpaper for 
your mobile phone at playboymobile.com. 


lone star style 


SUIT UP LIKE A BARON IN D-TOWN 
"Pull up in front of the Stanley Korshak store, flip the valet your 
keys and let the expert clothiers take care of the rest. This high-end 
Dallas boutique provides its customers with services usually 
reserved for celebrities and heads of state. If you can't find time to 
visit the store, an employee will make home or office appoint- 
ments for fittings, head-to-toe wardrobe consultations or a closet- 
editing session. The selection of luxury collections such as Kiton 
and Ralph Lauren Black Label is also a nice touch." 

—From Playboy.com's “10 Best Men's Clothing Boutiques" 


R A W DATA 


SIGNIFICA, INSIGNIFICA, STATS AND FACTS 


36% of Toyota 
Prius hybrid own- 
ers say they bought 
the car principally for its fuel economy; 57% give 
the reason that “it makes a statement about me.” 


* г 7 * - 
Bottlefield Earth 


4 out of 5 water bottles that can be recycled 
and reused end up as litter or in a landfill. 


| | 
Irish bookmaker Y 
Paddy Power PLC * ү: 
had rated Al Gore a 

14 to 1 long shot on \ 
its list of U.S. celeb- 

rities who will be 

arrested. The firm 

neglected to specify 

Al Gore Jr. and had 

to pay out $13,500 when the former veep's son, 

Al Gore Ill, was picked up for drug possession. 


Sausage Lovers 


25% of Italian women say their favorite aphro- 
disiac is a good salami. 


пуа! abir 
Disap )provai Ratings 


From a recent Gallup Poll, the ] 
percentages of Americans who According to a Clairol Color Attitudes Survey, 9396 of blondes see 


express "quite a lot" or "a great themselves as being popular with men, compared with 74% of 

deal" of confidence in: brunettes and only 64% of redheads. 

* The military: 69% 

* The police: 5496 TI ac imn ar Lila 

* The president: 25% Paris Hilton's stint in jail may have cost her $60 Americans discard 

* Congress: 14% million: Family patriarch Barron Hilton reportedly 26,000 mobile 
wrote her out of his will after she was arrested. phones every day. 


— Hard at Real Egghead 
$ 7 2 mi | ion Wo rk For $470 a pop, Catherine Zeta-Jones 


Paid at Christie's Not only do 87% has her hair smeared with caviar. | | 


auction house of Australians 
for Andy War- think office dal- 
hol’s Green Car liances aren't 
Crash, a new unethical, 20% 
record for the of them admit 
artist. His Lemon they've had 
Marilyn (left) sex at the 
was also sold, office during 
for $28 million. work hours. 


Go, Sea Cows 


The number of public 
schools in Florida 
named after George 
Washington: 5. The 
number named after 
manatees: 11. 


25 


No Country for Old Men 

(Tommy Lee Jones, Javier Bardem, Josh Brolin) Bloodbaths and 
pitch-black humor mark the Coen brothers“ latest. The drama 
unfolds after hunter Brolin comes across bullet-ventilated bod- 
ies and $2 million—the aftermath of a west Texas drug deal. 
Sheriff Jones tries to track down professional killer Bardem. 


Lions for Lambs 

(Tom Cruise, Meryl Streep, Robert Redford) Redford directs and 
co-stars in this drama in which he plays a poli-sci professor who 
urges a student not to join the military after two others are badly 
injured in Afghanistan. Streep plays a journalist putting the screws 
to Senator Cruise, a zealous supporter of the war on terror. 


Rendition 

(Jake Gyllenhaal, Reese Witherspoon, Meryl Streep) In this 
explosive political thriller, Gyllenhaal is an NSA analyst who wit- 
nesses a brutal U.S.-sanctioned interrogation of an Egyptian- 
born terror suspect. Witherspoon, the suspect's wife, tries to 
unravel the cover-up of his mysterious "disappearance." 


We Own the Night 

(Joaquin Phoenix, Mark Wahlberg, Robert Duvall) This gritty 
drama set in the late 19805 pits Brooklyn club manager Phoenix 
against Wahlberg, his NYPD brother, and father Duvall, a legend- 
ary police chief. A drug bust that ignites a street war between the 
cops and the Russian Mafia forces Phoenix to choose sides. 


movie of the month 


[ AMERICAN GANGSTER ] 


Denzel Washington gets dirty as a drug kingpin 


In the true fe inspired crime epic American Gangster, Den- 
zel Washington plays 1970s drug kingpin Frank Lucas, who 
for five years supplied Harlem with heroin smuggled in the 
caskets of dead soldiers returned from Vietnam. Going up 
against Washington is Russell Crowe playing Richie Roberts, 
the notorious New York policeman who eventually persuaded 
Lucas to turn informant against the cronies and dirty cops 
who helped consolidate his wealth and power. “Is there 
rough stuff? Of course," says director Ridley Scott. “That's 
who Lucas and Roberts were and what they were doing." 
The gritty drama, directed from a screenplay by Oscar win- 
ner Steven Zaillian, hits theaters with OscarJevel expecta- 
tions. As a budding still photographer 

in the 1960s, Scott had extensively "Is there 
documented the people and haunts of 

Harlem. “I think we got the universe of rough stuff? 
the movie right because | resisted Ho- Of course." 
lywoodizing it," says Scott. Asked 

whether there was any off-camera friction among the cast, 
Scott says, "That's the pain and pleasure of working with 
that caliber of actor. Half the time when you feel you have 
challenges, it's because they're doing their work, saying, 
‘Why are we doing this like that? Why not this instead?’ But 
out of that comes better. Both their performances are amaz- 
ing. One of the best cop movies l've ever seen is The French 
Connection. In a funny kind of way, that became our target. 
And we did pretty well, actually." — Stephen Rebello 


Our call: Standout perfor- 
mances, superb cinematography 
and a mood of stark melancholy 
make this film, based on Cor- 
mac McCarthy's brilliant 2005 
novel, a high-water mark. 


Our call: Kudos to the film- 
makers for grappling with 
complicated issues, but will 
audiences embrace what is 
essentially a lengthy politi- 
cal debate? 


Our call: Although the multistory 
trend (see Traffic, Syriana, Babel, 
etc.) has become a film cliché, 
this cautionary tale's torn-from- 
today's-headlines immediacy 
makes it worth your time, 


Our call: Strong performances 
(including one by the sizzling 
Eva Mendes) and some white- 
knuckle moments help over- 
come the post-Departed feeling 
of been there, done that. 


A + 


reviews [ dvds 


dvd of the month 


[ THE SARAH SILVERMAN PROGRAM: ] 
THE COMPLETE FIRST SEASON 1 


Television's twisted sister takes you inside her wacky world 


Beyond being an often hilarious look into a phony day in the life of a gifted comic, The 
Sarah Silverman Program, like the wornan herself, defies comparison. Silverman's act 
owes equal debts to Rita Rudner, Don Rickles and, in her penchant for song breaks, 


Tenacious D. Although she 
works with a supporting cast— 
including her older sister Laura, 
portraying her younger sister 
Laura—this six-episode Com 
edy Central run is all about 
Sarah. The humor from her 
stage act is imported into mun- 
dane environments with delight- 
fully absurd results. A fart-off in 
a restaurant, for instance, leads 
to Sarah shitting in her jeans 
and then to a fantasy sequence 
in which she sings a sweet song 
about it. Best extra: The sing- 
along-with-Sarah karaoke fea- 
ture. УУУУ —Greg Fagan 


SPIDER-MAN 3 Sam Raimi amps up the 
action and humor in this sequel. Having 
three villains—Sandman, Venom and New 
Goblin—muddles matters, but it's fun to 
watch Tobey Ma- 
guire tap into Spi- 
dey's dark side. 
Also on Blu-ray. 
Best extra: Fea- 
turette on creating 
Sandman. ¥¥¥ 

—Bryan Reesman 


JERICHO: SEASON 1 This acclaimed TV 
series got the green light for a second 
season after rabid protests from fans. 
It follows residents of a small Kansas 
town, fighting for 
survival after a 
mushroom cloud 
appears on the 
horizon, Best ex- 
tra: The “What If?” 
featurette. ¥¥¥ 

—Matt Steigbigel 


THE JAZZ SINGER—80TH ANNIVER- 
SARY 3-DISC COLLECTOR'S EDITION 
This 1927 classic was the first feature- 
length film to 
employ dialogue 
and musical num- 
bers in which the 
sound is synchro- 
nized with the 
Screen images. 
Usually forgotten 


is that it's also an enjoyable showbiz 
melodrama, with Al Jolson's star turn as 
an immigrant's son making good. Best 
extra: Nearly four hours' worth of restored 
Vitaphone shorts. ¥¥¥¥ —M.S. 


BLACK BOOK Paul Verhoeven proves 
there's credibility after Showgirls with 
this epic World War Il thriller, Carice van 
Houten stars as a chanteuse who, mask- 
ing her Jewish heritage, infiltrates the 
Gestapo on behalf of the Resistance. 
Twists, turns and unflinching nudity add up 
to an exhilarating 
experience. Also 
on Blu-ray. Best 
extra: The "Mak- 
ing of" offers 
more glimpses of 
lovely Van Houten. 
¥¥¥% —G.F. 


CASINO ROYALE Push PLAY, but first 
drop some acid, because that's what the 
six (!) directors seemed to have been on 
when shooting this 1967 psychedelic 
James Bond parody. David Niven and Peter 
Sellers both star as Bond—even Ursula 
Andress is a 007—trying to take down 
Woody Allen and 
Orson Welles. 
Confused? Wait 
for the drugs to 
kick in. Best ex- 
tra: The *Big Cli- 
max" featurette. 
YY —Buzz McClain 


SCANNER 


"IERI 


OCEAN'S 13 Danny (George Cloo- 
ney) and the boys are at it again, cre- 
ating havoc with an elaborate scheme 
to bring down orange-skinned Al Pa- 
cino's Las Vegas casino. It's a cool-cat 
cast having featherweight fun. ¥¥¥ 


ZR _ . Even with а soar- 
ing Silver Surfer and Jessica Alba in 
that skintight costume again, the anti- 
climactic Galactus confrontation is 
still a fantastic disappointment. yy 


1408 This hit Stephen King adapta- 
tion finds self-loathing ghost-tour au- 
thor John Cusack locked in a hostile 
haunted hotel room. It's creepy fun 
elevated by Cusack's deadpan quips 
about his implausible situation. ¥¥¥ 


character; бен 
SUR gags fill this NBC dramedy set 
backstage at a live TV show, but most 
viewers found it to be way too inside 
creator Aaron Sorkin's head. yy 


DAY WATCH The mind-melding ef- 
fects in this Goth sequel to the Russian 
Night Watch will keep you from caring 
that the plot involving good, evil and a 
piece of chalk makes as much sense 
as eating borscht for breakfast. УУУ 


YYYY Don't miss YY Worth a look 
УУУ Good show Y Forget it 


tease frame = = — 


She didn't win a Golden Globe for Norma 


Jean & Marilyn, but Mira Sorvino um 
leashed two of her own as Monroe. Will 
she do the same in Reservation Road? 


reviews Í games 


[ MASSIVE ATTACK ] 


| 
E E 


The next generation of big-world multiplayer games explodes on the Net 


Massively multiplayer online (MMO) games let you play with and folks who brought you Diablo, it heavily emphasizes action, allow- 
against thousands of people at once. Since its launch in 2004, ing you to play in styles from conventional MMO combat to first. 
World of Warcraft has dominated the genre and currently person shooting. The extensive single-player campaign has you 
boasts more than 9 million sub- squelching a demonic invasion 


scribers, each of whom pays 
$15 a month to play. Many have 
tried to repeat Warcraff's suc- 
cess, but none has succeeded, 
largely because most have 
essentially been making the 
same game. This fall, however, 
a new crop of MMOs is poised 
to hit the scene, offering new 
scenarios and unique game- 
play. Here's a taste (pictured 
clockwise from top left). 

TABULA RASA (playtr.com) 
Breaking from high fantasy, 
this sci-fi epic places you 
in a sprawling galactic war 
between a coalition of soldiers 


in postapocalyptic London. The 
dynamically generated multi- 
player areas offer infinite vistas 
of dystopian carnage. 
PIRATES OF THE BURNING 
SEA (burningsea.com) Gorgeous 
visuals, a fascinating economic 
model and an authentic period 
feel enhance your plying of the 
bloody seas of piracy's golden 
age. Align with France, England 
or Spain—or menace them as a 
buccaneer—as you engage in 
player-vs.-player melees, massive 
sea battles and even port sieges. 
This one does everything we 
wanted it to and much more. 


and a rabidly xenophobic race of aliens. From the mind of FURY (unleashthefury.com) Most MMOs vary their pacing from 
ММО legend Richard Garriott, it’s long on combat depth and exploration to combat to character management. Fury just goes 
rewards strategic thinking, while avoiding the soulless plots for the jugular. Focused solely on player-vs.-player battles, it 
that drag down so many of its ilk. packs a first-person-shooter intensity and employs a "classless" 
HELLGATE: LONDON (hellgatelondon.com) This hybrid game is system that lets you compete based on skill without spending 
an MMO with significant single-player components. From the half your life developing a character. —Chris Hudak 


30 


CONAN (360, PS3) Everyone's favor- 
ite barbarian stars in this grisly romp, 
whose aesthetic is closer to that of 
the books than the films. Reminiscent 
of God of War, the animation deftly 
captures the feline grace of the saw 
age warrior in battle. What it lacks in 
nuance is made up for with topless 
women in distress and a wry sense 
of humor. УУУ —#rian Crecente 


STAR WARS BATTLEFRONT: REN- 
EGADE SQUADRON (PSP) This 
portable sequel to the best-selling 
game is set during the time of the 
original film trilogy and centers on 
Han Solo and his band of pilots. 
Multiplayer-focused, it sports 16- 
player online gaming, 20 maps and 
extensively customizable characters 
and vehicles. ¥¥¥ on Gaudiosi 


NBA '08 (PS3) Sony's former bench- 
warmer earns a starting spot with 
killer visuals—its smooth HD anima- 
tions run at 60 frames a second— 
and intuitive motion-controlled 
moves. Plus, in a gaming first, as 
the season progresses you'll be able 
to download real-world matchups 
and game scenarios to test your 


GUITAR HERO 111: LEGENDS OF 
ROCK (360, PS2, PS3, Wii) The 
instant-classic faux-guitar-strumming 
game is back for a third round, offer- 
ing key features such as online play, 
along with a blazingly fresh slate of 
tunes from the Stones to the Strokes. 
New head-to-head "battle modes" 
and real rock stars round out another 


mettle. УУУУ 


ORANGE BOX (360, PC, PS3) This 
mammoth collection includes two 
award-winning action games, Half-Life 
2 and its first expansion, Episode 
One. It then tosses in the new expan- 
sion, Episode Two, plus multiplayer 
title Team Fortress 2 and the experi- 
mental action-puzzle hybrid Portal. 
Stop what you're doing and go buy it 
now. УУУУ —Marc Saltzman 


—Scott Steinberg 


stellar outing. УУУУ —M.S. 


TONY HAWK'S PROVING GROUND 
(360, PS2, PS3, Wii) Seventeen real 
life skaters thrash their way through 
Philly, D.C. and Baltimore in this 
update of the venerable series. Pre- 
viously complicated slow-motion 
tricks are smoother this time, and 
winning online showdowns earns you 
money for gear upgrades and cooler 
stunts. ¥¥¥ —Damon Brown 


WHERE AND HOW TO BUY ON PAGE 127 


ADVERTORIAL 


FLATBOTL ANTERFILEWV: KANE 


А candid conversation with a convicted killer about a 


final assign- 


ment that left 25 dead and why he looks forward to his own execution 


Convicted on 25 counts of manslaugh- 
ler—and implicated in countless other 
unsolved crimes across the globe—the killer 
known simply as Kane 15 the only link to the 
illustrious criminal organization called The 
7. Little is known about The 7 except that il 
is capable of achieving any nefarious objec 
live in any part of the world for the right 
price. Kane says he is nol a professional 
killer because his two-year-old son shot him 
self with his gun. He isn't a killer because 
his wife blamed him for и and left him. “I 
don't like excuses," Kane says. 

Once a renowned foreign correspon- 
dent, contribuling writer PETER STACK has 
devoted the latter half of his professional 
career tracking the operations of The 7. 
Stack's family was ripped apart when he 
and his sister were held hostage during a 
bank robbery in Scotland, a robbery Stack 
believes was commitied by The 7. During 
this incident Stacks sister and brother-in 
law were both killed, and Stack's only clue 
to the identity of the perpetrators is a small 
{айоо of a spade and a name. Months ago, 
Stack received anonymous CCTV footage of 
Kane's operation in Venezuela that left 25 
dead. One of the masked killers is adorned 
with the very same latloo. Always fashion- 
ably dressed, it could only be Kane. 

Stack met Kane minutes afler a judge 
ordered his execution. By the time this 


"I have been waiting my entire career lo meet a 
member of The 7. 1 am surprised to see the clear 
intelligence m Kane's eyes. He is nol crazy. He 
is relaxed and almost likeable. That makes him 
even more frightening.” 


interview ts published, Kane will have been 
transferred to California's San Quentin 
Stale Prison, where he will await his fate 
on death row. Stack reports: “The 7 is a 
group so feared and respected in the crimi- 
nal underworld that ds name is rarely spo- 
ken above a whisper. And here sits Kane, 
the first concrete evidence that The 7 exists, 
validation for my entire career speni fol- 
lowing an organization that is little more 
than rumor and myth, As I approach, Kane 
calmly lights a cigarette, looks me in the eye 
and says, “What the fuck do you want?'" 


PLAYBOY: Do you deserve to die? 

KANE: That's what the judge said. 
PLAYBOY: Do you feel guilty for your 
crimes? 

KANE: I'm about to put on an orange 


jumpsuit and get on a bus with barred 


windows. I sure as hell am not innocent. 
I acknowledge the pain I've caused. But 
ll be honest and say that I'm not really 
feeling much anymore. You get numb as 
the years go by. 

PLAYBOY: How do you want your family to 
remember you? 

KANE: [Pauses] I don't want them to. It 
will be easier that way. 

PLAYBOY: Are you saying your family isn't 
important to you? 

KANE: I'm saying my family is impor- 


On the smoking: 

“Kane smokes an entire pack in 10 minutes, | 
ask ham why he smokes so much and he says he 
wants the cigarettes lo get him before the electric 
chair does.” 


tant to me. That's why all they need to 
remember about me is that | was sorry 
that I left them when they needed me 
the most. Га do anything to make that 
up to them. 

PLAYBOY: You sound as if you're looking 
forward to your execution. 

KANE: That's what prison food will do 
to you. [Smokes] Not everything you're 
heard about me is true. Most of it is. By 
now, dying is the easy part, 

PLAYBOY: You've been linked with high- 
profile heists, bank robberies and mur- 
ders around the world. Was it hard to go 
to work every day? 

KANE: In the beginning, yes. But I've 
never had the choice not to ро—Гуе 
never had the opportunity to return 
to a normal life. 1 lost that privilege a 
long time ago. But yes, I did enjoy the 
money. 

PLAYBOY: Tell me about The 7 

КАМЕ: [Smokes] That your lucky number? 
PLAYBOY: Or an international criminal 
organization that is believed to have 
stolen more than $14 billion in the past 
20 years, leaving hundreds dead in the 
process. It's also rumored that The 7 is 
the only group to have ever successfully 
broken into the United States Treasury. 

KANE: You think you know a lot of things, 
don't you? [Pauses] There is no 7, not 


PHOTOGRAPHY BY DOS 


On the manne; 

"Most people, killers or not, wende love a movie 
and game created about their life. Not Kane. 
"Look, he says, ГИ be dead and my family won't 
get a dime." 


anymore, There's just me. I hope you 
sleep easier tonight. 

PLAYBOY: Are you saying you are the only 
remaining member of The 7? Tell me 
about the man called Flame. 

KANE: Flame? 1 don't know where you 
get your information, but you don't want 
to know any more about The 7. 
PLAYBOY: Do you remember a bank rob- 
bery in Scotland? The police found a 
man dead in a bank with an ace of spades 
on his forehead, covered in blood and 
a woman shot execution style at her 
home. 

KANE: [Parses] No, 1 don't remember. We 
robbed a lot of banks. 

PLAYBOY: What does the tattoo on your 
wrist stand for? 

KANE: [Pauses, rubs tattoo) It stands for 
"Go fuck yourself." 

PLAYBOY: Before Venezuela, you had never 
been captured. What went wrong? 
KANE: Everything. Maybe we just got 
old. 

PLAYBOY: It's been reported that the take 
on this heist was among the largest in 
history. 

KANE: It was supposed to be the last job 


ADVERTORIAL 


I would ever need. [looks around cell] I 
guess they were right. Retirement jobs 
are always too big. 

PLAYBOY: If you hadn't been caught, what 
would you be doing now? 

KANE: It doesn't matter. I got caught, 25 
more people are dead, and now I'm in 
here. Planning my dream vacation isn't 
going to change anything. 

PLAYBOY: Is there anything you would 
like to say to your victims? 

KANE: [Smokes] See you soon. 

PLAYBOY: How did you get the scar on 
your right eye? 

KANE: Everyone has scars in this business. 
[pauses] 1 made a mistake once and the 
scar is to make sure 1 don't forget about it. 
Some of them are placed visibly; some 
are more hidden. Depends on how big 
you fucked up. 

PLAYBOY: With all the horrors you've 
seen, why did you continue to work for 
The 7? 

KANE: : Ги good at what I do, plus, once 
you get involved you don't just decide 
one day that you want to stop. These 
things don't work that way 

PLAYBOY: How do you respond to reports 


that a movie and video game are being 
created based on your life and The 7? 
KANE: [Laughs] A movie about my life? 
I'm no celebrity. I wouldn't pay to see 
that. 

PLAYBOY: : Is there an actor that you 
would like to portray you? 

KANE: Maybe De Niro. I think he can 
capture my sensitive side. [smokes] И 
doesn't matter. By the time it comes out, 
I'll be dead. 

PLAYBOY: Alter working with The 7, did 
you fear for the safety of your family? 
KANE: Enough fuckin’ questions about 
my family, you should start fearing about 
your own. When you work for The 7 they 
are your family, Next question. 

PLAYBOY: Tell me about Jenny. 

KANE: I think is where we stop. 

PLAYBOY: Please, if 1 could just have a few 
more minutes. 

KANE: I'm sorry. I don't have that many 
left. Nice meeting you. 


FOR A COMPLETE PROFILE ON THE KILLER 
KANE AND ADDITIONAL INFORMATION OF 
THE TRUE NATURE OF THE 7, READ PETER 
STACK'S BLOG AT PETERSTACK7.COM. 


Time in a Bottle 
In search of the finest cabernet America has to offer 


THE UNDISPUTED KING of all grapes, cabernet sauvignon, hails from the Bordeaux region of France. But in a testament to America's 
thirst for the bold and the beautiful, we now grow more of it in California. What do we look for in a California cab? The same traits we 
look for in women: individuality, complexity and a great body. Consider this your shopping list. Best picks for $25: Bennett Family 
Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley Reserve 2004 is a fruity wine with black-currant and plum aromas, followed by cedar and tobacco 
notes. In a word, smooth. St. Francis Cabernet Sauvignon Sonoma 2004 features cherry and cedar aromas wrapped around a supple 
texture. Best picks for $50 and under: Jordan Cabernet Sauvignon Alexander Valley 2003 is a cabernet-heavy Bordeaux-style blend 
(with merlot, cabernet franc and petit verdot). It whispers French finesse but screams American dynamism, with aromas of black 
cherry and dark chocolate. Artesa Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley Reserve 2004 bursts with spicy blackberry and cherry notes, with 
a vanilla-scented finish. A special-occasion wine: Hundred Acre Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley Kayli Morgan Vineyard 2004 ($250) 
defines opulence, boasting boatloads of cassis, cherry and mocha flavors. Age it for a few years and perfect gets even better. 


м, Wine Li$t 
THE WORLD'S FIVE most expensive bot- 


A tles of vino on the market now: Cháteau Le 
ae Pin Pomerol 2004 ($1,500) This magical 
Bordeaux comes from a tiny vineyard of 
less than five acres. Cháteau Ausone St. Emilion 2003 
($2,250) Grapes have been cultivated on this soil since 
the second century A. o. Chateau Pétrus Pomerol 2003 
($2,400) Cabernet sauvignon is the famous grape of 
Bordeaux, but Pétrus is 90 percent merlot. Screaming 
Eagle Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2002 ($2,500) 
Founded in 1989, Screaming Eagle is California's ulti- 
mate cult winery. Domaine de la Romanée-Conti La 
Täche Burgundy 2003 ($3,000) This vineyard produces 
the scarcest, most coveted wine on earth. 


Just in Case 


THIS PORTABLE MINI cigar bar from 
Max Benjamin ($295, maxbenjamin 
сот) is the perfect product for the mod- 
ern executive who likes to seal his deals 
the old-fashioned way—by thoroughly 
marinating his clients with 15-year-old 
scotch and then lighting them up with 
a quality smoke. It features a cedar- 
lined humidor (pictured open 
here), four shatterproof 
glasses, a mini ice bucket 
and a butane lighter. You 
provide the scotch, sto- 
gies and smooth talk. 


sa MANTRACK 


w о r k w h e 


All Hands on Desk 


MILLION-DOLLAR IDEAS strike when you least expect them. 
This streamlined, timelessly luxe Bottega Veneta desk, leather- 
lined with gunmetal accents ($19,400, bottegaveneta.com), 
sits ready to support your genius. The coolest feature of this 
stylishly fortified bunker of productivity is perhaps its three 
front drawers outfitted with a slow-close mechanism that gen- 
erously leaves those texting thumbs intact. Che bella. 


Schnell! Schnell! 


A THOUGHT OCCURRED to us as we were motoring down a windswept autobahn outside Berlin at 130 miles an hour in the car you see 
here: Aside from a van that had a bed in the back, we've never had this much fun in a Volkswagen. VW is billing its 2008 R32 as “the 
race car for everyday driving." Actually it's a tricked-out GTI with a 3.2-liter V6 that generates 250 bhp at 6,300 rpm. Its 6.4-second 
zero-to-60 sprintability and top end of 140-plus mph are hardly shabby. The V6 is mated to a six-speed, dual-clutch DSG automatic 
with paddle shifters. With this dub's lowered ride height, all-wheel drive and leechlike grip, crisp handling is its forte. Think of it as an 
Audi TT with a backseat for less money (base: $33,360). VW is building only 5,000 R32s for America. More info at vw.com. 


Open Face 


WE'VE SEEN SOME trippy 
timepieces in our day but 
none like this Reverso Trip- 
tyque from Jaeger-LeCoultre 
($375,000, jaeger-lecoultre 
com), whose case opens to 
reveal a second and third dial. 
With an over-the-top 18 compli- 
cations, the watch has a tourbil- 
lon on the main dial, celestial 
complications on the second and 
a perpetual calendar with moon 
phase on the third. This could 
come in handy, especially if 
you're a lycanthropic astrologer. 


== MANTRACK 


AS TELEVISIONS YIELD to media centers, we need 
more precise ways to control our entertainment without 
leaving the couch. Between a mouse and a remote lies 
Logitech's MX Air ($150, logitech.com), a wireless point- 
ing device that can be used like a typical mouse or 
waved in the air like a Wii controller. Meant for manag- 
ing home PCs piped through your entertainment center, 
it's the perfect balance of precision and leisure. 


Seeing the Light 


EVERYONE HAS A LITTLE mad scientist in them—some 
even have big mad scientists in them. Let them out to play 
with lighting from Frank Buchwald's Machine Lights series 
(from $2,700, frankbuchwald.de). Among the most refresh- 
ingly twisted interior designs we've seen, these lamps are 
equally at home in the modern hipster's salon or Dr. Frank- 
enstein's lab. Each piece is made by hand in Berlin and 
takes four weeks to craft from hand-burnished steel and 
brass. Just keep an eye peeled for torch-wielding villagers. 


Everybody Into the Pool 


THE DARK BROWN leather-rimmed pool table covered in 
green felt is a classic. However, it will make your house look 
like a bar—either a dive bar or a fern bar, depending on its 
condition. Insulate yourself from both of these pernicious 
decor choices with a Waterfall pool table from Olhausen Bil- 
liards (from $8,250, olhausenbilliards.com). A modern mas- 
terpiece, it's shown here in hard maple appointed with red 
worsted cloth, but since each of these tables is custom-made, 
you can design yours down to the material on the pockets. 
WHERE AND HO'W TO BUY ON PAGE 127 


De Playboy Advisor 


M; boyfriend and I plan to get married 
in the near future. The problem is my 
parents are Ahmadi Muslims and would 
be averse to my marrying someone like 
my fiancé, who is agnostic and Cauca- 
sian. I am also agnostic. Islam dictates 
that a Muslim woman marry only a Mus- 
lim man, as a man of another faith may 
lead her astray. My parents have told me 
many stories of families crippled by the 
revelation that their daughter was mar- 
rying outside the faith. My siblings have 
advised me to say nothing to my parents, 
even after I've taken my vows. One sister 
told me to move far away. I do not want 
to break my parents' hearts, but I don't 
want to break my own, either. Please 
understand that my parents are immi- 
grants who find American culture a little 
jarring. They are not bad people, but 
they are inflexible. Think of them with 
respect,—A.A., Fargo, North Dakota 

One or another of your predicaments (mar- 
rying a non-Muslim, being agnostic) would be 
easier to resolve; together they are a double 
whamnty that will almost certainly lead to your 
estrangement. Although it will be painful, we 
believe it’s best that you be forthright. (None of 
this is a concern for Muslim men, who can 
marry anyone they like. Go figure.) You cer- 
tainly aren't the only Muslim woman facing 
this dilemma. Daisy Khan, executive director 
of the American Society for Muslim Advance- 
ment, who has counseled more than 100 inter- 
faith couples, points out that while many 
immigrants’ children now in their 30s have 
married Muslims, many in their mid-20s have 
not. “Children feel a certain guilt and obliga- 
tion to do right by their parents, but love is a 
strong force,” she says. She notes that because 
of a shortage of eligible Muslim men in the 
U.S. (in part because many are finding wives 
overseas), it’s unrealistic to expect every Mus- 
lim woman here to marry within her faith. 
Before announcing your engagement, it may 
help to discuss with your fiancé what you 
believe—that is, what values you will teach 
your children. Certainly you both admire ele- 
ments of your faith and culture. That may be 
all you have to offer your family. 


Despite my reservations I let my wife go 
to an event at the Mansion. Later, while 
browsing the images on her digital camera, 
I came across one in which she is sitting on 
a guy's lap with his arm draped over her 
shoulder and his hand cupping her tit. I 
told her I was not happy to see this, and 
she got pissed. My wife is hot, and the fact 
that she allowed another man to touch 
her, let alone in public, has me spun out. 
Since she went with a friend who is equally 
hot, I am sure there are other photos. I 
have not asked if she did anything more, 
because it would kill me if she did. I also 
don't want her to lie. Am I making too 
much of this? Before she went she asked 


me if I trusted her. I told her I did, but 
now I'm not sure. I think she broke the 
rules.—J.S., San Diego, California 

We have no special knowledge of your 
wife's visit, but she owes you an explanation 
and perhaps an apology. At the same time, 
one grope doesn't make you a dope. You need 
to be careful not to become an overbearing 
husband, We suspect you can’t believe some- 
one so desirable would choose to be with you, 
but believe it because there she is. Whatever 
drunken fun your wife had in fantasyland, 
she came home to you. If you aren’t careful, 
your fear of losing her may drive her away. 


| enjoyed your response on the mak- 
ing of martinis (August). Like Winston 
Churchill, I never waste good gin Бу add- 
ing vermouth. I fill a glass with crushed 
ice, then add Bombay Sapphire, fol- 
lowed by a twist of lemon, olives or both 
(an oliver twist). As they say, martinis 
are like women's breasts: One is never 
enough, and three are too many.—M.W., 
Ann Arbor, Michigan 
Who shesh too is three many? 


| realize that defining the "perfect" mar- 
tini is akin to discussing the best way 
to get out of Iraq, but I'd like to weigh 
in. Crush a bunch of ice (I use an old 
crank-style crusher, which is more fun) 
and put a handful into your screw-top 
shaker. Retrieve your glass and gin 
from the freezer. Pour a tiny amount of 
vermouth—maybe 10 drops—into the 
bottle's cap, toss that into the shaker 
and quickly add enough cold gin to fill 
your glass. Shake vigorously to infuse 
the drink with tiny bubbles. (For what- 
ever reason, I think this is important.) 
Place a pinch of crushed ice in your glass, 


ILLUSTRATION BY ISTVAN BANYAI 


and pour. Drink before the ice melts and 
the mixture gets watered down. There's 
nothing better than an ice-cold martini 
but few things worse than a warm one. 
You can get away with using vodka, 
but adding apple flavor, chocolate, etc., 
makes it a cocktail. You'll rarely get one 
at a bar that's dry enough. Most bartend- 
ers don't like gin martinis, so they never 
learned how to make them. They'll also 
try to serve you cold gin with no ver- 
mouth.—M.A., Nashville, Tennessee 
Time for another! 


Ir you’re talking about martinis, you 
can't overlook the gibson, which has its 
own controversial history. Many people 
believe adding à pickled onion or lemon 
twist turns a martini into a gibson, but 
there's more to it. My grandfather told 
my father, who told me, that at the Pal- 
ace Hotel in San Francisco a bartender 
named Gibson would premix gin with a 
small amount of vermouth and put the 
container and some glasses into the ice- 
box. When a customer ordered a gibson, 
the bartender poured the cold ingredi- 
ents into a chilled glass. I have found a 
few bars that still serve the gibson this 
way, which I take as a sign of quality. If 
you decide to serve gibsons at a party, 
be prepared to have a few overnight 
guests.—M.B., Oceanside, California 

There are a number of stories about this 
drink's origins. One credits Walter D.K. 
Gibson, who is said to have created it at the 
Bohemian Club in San Francisco, circa 1900, 
Another honors illustrator Charles Dana Gib- 
son, who around the turn of the century sup- 
posedly began a trend at the Players Club in 
New York by ordering water served in a mar- 
tini glass and garnished with a silver-shinned 
cocktail onion. Seeing this, his friends began 
asking for onions in their alcoholic drinks. A 
patron brought the gibson to Murphy's Pub in 
Dublin, which began serving it with a radish; 
hence the murphy. 


м, guy came over to show me а move 
called the nines, which he learned from 
the Advisor (August). Thanks to your 
advice, I had my first orgasm during 
intercourse, [ am so happy, I bought him 
a subscription.—A. N., Tyler, Texas 

Our circulation department is now has- 
sling us to share more tricks. 


| fear some of your advice may be leading 
younger readers astray. In my long and 
fruitful years of cocksmanship, I cannot 
recall a woman ever telling me to go slow 
and shallow as you describe in the rule 
of nines. They always want harder, faster 
and deeper, just like in porn. As for trac- 
ing the alphabet on a woman's clit with 
your tongue (August), the vulva is not 


a blackboard, and your tongue is not a 39 


PLAYBOY 


piece of chalk. Women like it loud, sloppy 
and wet. If your face isn't soaked, you're 
not doing it right. Finally, your advice that 
"the modern heterosexual male need not 
feel guilty about being penetrated" is so 
wrong.—C.S., Hollywood, Florida 

(1) Years of "cocksmanship"? Are you 
serious? (2) You may well be right about 
what the women you've slept with liked. (3) 
Welcome to the new century. 


M; boyfriend loves to come on my face. 
A few weeks ago he said he wanted to try 
something crazy: He wanted to film me 
going through the drive-through of a fast- 
food restaurant with come on my face. 
After a drink or two I said, "Okay, fuck 
it. Let's go." I knew he would love it, and 
honestly, it was a rush. Now he wants to 
do it again. My question is, are we doing 
anything illegal? We want to be daring 
but not so daring we end up with a police 
record.—M.S., Las Cruces, New Mexico 

There's nothing illegal about it beyond 
breaking the laws of good taste. 


To A.B. from Austin: Your August let- 
ter was such a turn-on, I found myself 
masturbating to the thought of you mas- 
turbating to the thought of a guy mas- 
turbating to the thought of you.—T.M., 
Mesa, Arizona 

Okay, that's enough. 


ln July a reader voiced concern that his 
co-workers don't wash their hands after 
using the restroom, but you responded 
without explaining why washing is even 
necessary. In most modern restrooms a 
man can urinate without touching any- 
thing but his zipper and his member. 
Plus, urine is normally sterile. I doubt 
the perfunctory 15-second wash helps 
anyway.—C.B., East Lansing, Michigan 
In brief reply to the many readers who have 
written to say their penises aren't dirty: As a 
habit you should wash your hands a few times 
each day, and it's most convenient to do so 


when you find yourself next to a sink. 


Having spent 45 years in the higher-end 
men’s clothing business, I must take issue 
with the idea expressed in August that 
“a proper monogram is rarely observed 
by anyone but the gentleman wearing 
the shirt.” My monogram is on the left 
cuff. Advise A.B. in Indianapolis that 
his savoir faire is not in danger if his 
total image reflects an awareness of and 
appreciation for the difference between 
old-school rules and personal style. It's 
more than the monogram.—Richard 
Brooks, Brooks & Sons, Amarillo, Texas 

There is no rule that can't be broken, but it 
usually takes a special man to do it. 


One night after great sex, my wife and I 
were sharing fantasies and I told her every 
man dreams of having sex with two women 
at once. (Honestly, it was the only fantasy 
I could think of.) Now her feelings are 


40 hurt, and no amount of groveling seems 


to make up for it. It's not as if I mentioned 
names. Am I missing something here? She 
always reads the Advisor, so if you could 
respond in the magazine it may go a long 
way toward making her happy with me 
again.—K.B., Atlanta, Georgia 

If your wife always reads the Advisor, she is 
aware of how often this fantasy comes up in 
letters from both men and women. In fact, our 
book Dear Playboy Advisor devotes a whole 
chapter to the topic. If that doesn't convince 
her, we're not sure what will. Thank God your 
fantasy wasn't about having sex with another 
woman without your wife. 


Sometimes I can drink beer all night, 
and other times I have two or three 
bottles and break out in hives. This 
makes me feel uncomfortable going 
out with friends, and it doesn't help me 
meet women. What's the story?—D.L.., 
Winston-Salem, North Carolina 
You probably have a barley allergy, which is 
a rare or underrecognized condition known as 
beer anaphylaxis. To confirm, have an aller- 
gist do a scratch test. It could be worse—a few 
e are so sensitive they can't even touch 
beer. The only beer we know of that doesn't 
contain barley is New Grist (newgrist.com), 
made with sorghum and rice. 


А; an emergency-room physician for 25 
years, I am disappointed with the advice 
you gave a reader in July about sharing 
his HIV status with his doctors. Many 
diseases are unique to or more common 
in the HIV-positive community. Also, 
some drugs cause side effects for this 
population, and others are inappropri- 
ate for diseases an HIV-positive patient 
may contract. While health-care profes- 
sionals need to take precautions, patients 
should disclose all medical conditions, 
including HIV, if they want the appro- 
priate treatment. Patients who treat HIV 
as a scourge only perpetuate their mis- 
treatment, both socially and medically. 
I have never heard a fellow health-care 
provider make disparaging remarks after 
coming in contact with a patient who has 
HIV.—T.B., Albany, Georgia 

We are happy to share this information, but 
the reader asked only if the law requires him 
to disclose his condition. It does not. While it's 
wonderful that you and the other doctors who 
wrote treat everyone the same, you're living 
in a cave if you believe HIV-positive patients 
never suffer discrimination. 


А reader wrote in July asking about 
techniques to remember people's names. 
Many years ago a business-school profes- 
sor shared a method that today allows 
me to enter a room with 50 strangers 
and leave an hour later saying good-bye 
to at least 35 by name. The brain remem- 
bers the written word much better than 
the spoken word. So when you meet 
people for the first time, imagine their 
name written in block letters across their 
forehead. Then repeat the name at least 
twice while looking at the letters. "Hello, 


BILL. It's nice to finally meet you, вид.” It 
works.—E.B., Las Vegas, Nevada 

You're right. Just don't get caught staring 
at their forehead. 


A few years ago I bought a bar and 
quickly realized it was good for busi- 
ness to remember customers’ names. I 
became adept at concentrating on each 
face and saying the names aloud. On one 
occasion an attractive woman came in for 
the first time and stayed for half an hour. 
When she returned six months later, I 
greeted her by name. She said I had an 
incredible memory. I replied, "Actually, I 
have a lousy memory. I remember only 
things that are important to me." In that 
instant I think I could have had her on 
the nearest table.—R.N., Dallas, Texas 
As we said, its a skill that pays dividends. 


I'm 26 and dating a 28-year-old guy. 
We have been seeing each other for six 
months and living together for two. When 
I moved in, I told my boyfriend I loved 
him. His response? A nervous chuckle. 
"No, you don't," he said. "Yes, I do." He 
chuckled again. "No, you don't." I started 
crying. He tried to hug me, but I pushed 
him away. He said he didn't mean to 
laugh and told me I meant a lot to him. 
But when we're lying in bed together and 
I want to say "I love you so much," I can't 
because I know it won't be reciprocated. 
How do I get over this? Or should I not 
get over it?—K.G., Lake Forest, Illinois 
Sharing space represents a serious commit- 
ment. Who suggested it? The relationship is 
moving at a gallop, and for whatever reason 
your boyfriend prefers to stroll. If and when 
he expresses his love, at least you'll know he's 
sincere—assuming you're still around to hear it. 


1 don’t mind my husband looking at 
other women, but he also looks at porn 
online. I'm a typical Finnish girl, blonde 
and pale, but online he searches for bru- 
nettes, Asians and Latinas. I believe there 
is someone out there for everyone. Since 
I look so different from the women my 
husband prefers, does that mean Гт not 
his someone]. N., Presque Isle, Maine 

Men love variety; it’s our nature. Your 
husband's smorgasbord fantasies are normal. 
He doesn't fantasize about pale, blonde Finns 
because he has a real one at home. 


All reasonable questions—from fashion, food 
and drink, stereos and sports cars to dating 
dilemmas, taste and etiquette—will be per- 
sonally answered if the writer includes a 
self-addressed, stamped envelope. The most 
interesting, pertinent questions will be pre- 
sented in these pages each month. Write the 
Playboy Advisor, 730 Fifth Avenue, New 
York, New York 10019, or send e-mail by vis- 
iting our website at playboyadvisor.com. The 
Advisor's latest book, Dear Playboy Advisor, is 
available at bookstores, by phoning 800-423- 
9494 or online at playboystore.com. 


THE PLAYBOY FORUM 
WHY DON’T LIBERALS DREAM? 


DEMOCRATS DON'T UNDERSTAND WHY AMERICANS 
NEED SPECTACLE IN POLITICS 


BY STEPHEN DUNCOMBE 


| Gore's recent book The Assault on Reason decries the 

eclipse of reason and reality in politics. The intracta- 

ble war in Iraq, he says, along with the undermining 
of civil liberties and the response (or lack thereof) to global 
warming, has been conceived in fantasy and sold through 
spin. The former vice president's solution to this state of 
political affairs is simple: a return to the "rule of reason." 

While reading Gore's smart and sober book, I was 

reminded of "The Emperor's New Clothes," Hans Chris- 
tian Andersen's story about an emperor who is tricked into 
buying a spectacular suit of nonexistent clothing. Eager 
to show it off, he parades through town in the buff as the 
crowd admires his imaginary attire. Then a young boy 
cries out, "But he has nothing on." Upon hearing this 
undeniable fact, the 
people whisper it ear 
to ear, awaken from 
their illusion and live 
happily ever after. 
Isn't this the primal 
fantasy of all liberals? 
Reveal the truth and 
the scales will fall from 
people's eyes. They 
will see the world as 
it really is—which of 
course means seeing 
it as liberals see it. 
Ihe problem is this: 
Most liberals don't 
see politics-ruled-by 
reason for what it 
really is, a fairy tale. 

Academic depart 
ments notwithstand- 
ing, politics isn't a science, There are no immutable laws 
that determine an election's outcome or empirical tests to 
indicate what constitutes a good society. Political systems 
are human creations that are then evaluated subjectively 
by more humans. When we speak of ordering society in 
one way or another, we're really saying we want society 
to be a certain way. When we argue that the world might 
be other than what it is, we're really just imagining that 
the world could be different—and then dreaming what 
this future may be. The issue isn't whether we can do 
without feeling and fantasy in politics but whether we can 
be honest about how we use them. 

The reluctance of liberals to engage in such dream- 
politik is understandable. The current masters of this 
trade are an unsavory bunch: Dick Cheney, Karl Rove 
and Scott Sforza, the man said to be responsible for 
imagineering President George W. Bush's “Mission 
Accomplished" landing on the deck of the USS Abraham 
Lincoln. But if you insist on adhering to reason and real- 


ity, you deed valuable territory to the other side, Worse, 
it means dreampolitik is never reimagined. By refusing 
to engage constructively with fantasy and desire, liber- 
als can't imagine how a politics that acknowledges and 
embraces the power of dreams could be conceptualized 
differently and employed ethically. 

As unlikely as it seems, Las Vegas provides a model of eth- 
ical spectacle. If you've been to Sin City in the past decade, 
you can attest to its remarkable visual transformation. 
Cheap billboards, garish neon and blocky casinos have been 
replaced by an elaborate faux New York skyline and the 
immediately recognizable, if oddly positioned, landmarks 
of Paris. Down the street are Egyptian pyramids made of 
glass, and up the Strip are the grand palaces of a virtual 

Venice. It is the nature 
of this fantasy and fak- 
ery that is so interest- 
ing. Yes, Las Vegas is 
fake. This is decried by 
sober American think- 
ers ("the evisceration 
of reality by its simula- 
tion") and celebrated 
by enthusiastic French 
intellectuals ("the evis- 
ceration of reality by 
its simulation!”), but 
both seem to miss the 
point. A fake is fake 
only if people believe 
it references some- 
thing real. It's doubt- 
ful anyone mistakes 
the New York-New 
York Hotel & Casino 
for the real city or feels as though he has gone to Egypt. 
The crowds that love Las Vegas know it's merely a fan 
tasy. That's part of the reason they love it. 

Counter this with the performance of the president 
landing on the aircraft carrier, wearing his codpiece-fitted 
flight suit. This was an attempt to pass off fantasy as real- 
ity: Bush is a war hero, not a combat dodger, and the war 
is won, not just beginning. (I won't even speculate on the 
phantasmagoria of the president's stuffed crotch.) The 
spectacle in the Nevada desert works according to dif- 
ferent principles. It's transparent—a dream consciously 
understood as a dream. No one is fooled, and truth is not 
a casualty, What is being sold, and what is being enjoyed, is 
illusion, not delusion. Perhaps what happens in Las Vegas 
shouldn't just stay in Las Vegas. 

It is а common mistake to think reality and fantasy 
inhabit separate spheres. They don't. They coexist and 
intermingle. Reality needs fantasy to render it desirable, 
just as fantasy needs reality to make it believable. To 


embrace dreams and make peace with 
spectacle doesn't mean you have to 
abandon your faith in a politics ruled 
by reason, It means you acknowledge 
that it's only a faith. Perhaps people 
can, and probably should, study the 
reality of the world, make reasoned 
political judgments and act accord- 
ingly. But this way of seeing and being 
doesn't have any taken-for-granted 
epistemological foundation. It is, to 
use academic jargon, a system of dis- 
course that must be (re)created, imag- 
ined, operationalized and dramatized 
to appeal to the public's imagination. 
That, incidentally, is something Gore 
does well in his environmental docu- 
mentary An Inconvenient Truth. 

We liberals like to comfort ourselves 
with age-old adages that “truth will 
out” and “the truth shall make you 
free.” But the truth does not reveal 
itself by virtue of being the truth; it 
must be told. It needs stories woven 
around it and works of art made about 
it. It must be embedded in narratives 
that connect with people's dreams and 
desires and resonate with meaningful 
symbols and myths, The argument 
here is not for a progressive movement 
that lies but for a propaganda of the 
truth, As the American philosopher 
William James wrote, “Truth happens 
to an idea.” Waiting for the truth to set 
you free is lazy politics. 

While liberals are historically wed- 
ded to reason and reality, there is a 
counterhistory of the left that has long 
embraced the dreamscape of the imagi- 
nary, that uses symbolism and narrative 
to try to create new realities. What were 
democracy, socialism, the New Deal, 
civil rights, feminism and gay libera- 
tion if not, at one time, unreasonable 
fantasies? Ironically, progressives once 
had a near monopoly on political fan- 
tasy. It was conservatives who wanted 
to defend the real and retain the status 
quo. Radicals wanted to move toward 
an imaginary future, Who, after all, 
is remembered for declaring "I have 
a dream”? But progressives regularly 
disown their own often effective his- 
tory of mobilizing fantasy. They imag- 
ine their superior sense of seriousness 
will win debates, convince the public 


and lead them back into the halls of 


power. This is a dream that keeps lib- 
erals and the left from doing the type 
of dreaming required to find a new 
direction for this country and win the 
popular support to get us there. 


Stephen Duncombe is author of Dream: 
Re-Imagining Progressive Politics in an 
Age of Fantasy. 


FORUM 


CORNEL WEST TALKS 
RHYMES AND RACE 


HE SAYS ARTISTS CAN USE WORDS NEWSPAPERS CAN'T 


By Tim Mohr 


ornel West is a professor at 

Princeton and an American 

Book Award winner, and this 
summer he released his second album, 
Never Forget: A Journey of Revelations, 
which features guest appearances by 
Prince, André 3000, Rhymefest, Talib 
Kweli and others. We asked him about 
the issues of race that play a promi- 
nent role in his new songs. 
PLAYROY: At its annual meeting in July, 
the NAACP held a mock funeral for the 
word nigger. Do you think symbolic ges- 
tures of this sort help reduce the use of 
the word, something you too seek? 
WEST: Steve Harvey also gave a 
eulogy for the word on the radio this 
past summer. Symbolic gestures do 
play a role because they affect con- 
sciousness, make people more alert 
and aware. But it's not going to lead 
to a vast reform of the language of 
black culture and youth culture. So 
much more than symbolic gestures is 
needed to eliminate the use of the 
word. I think in the case of black 
people it's very complicated. There's 
a certain rhythmic seduction to the 
word. If you speak in a sentence and 
you have to say "cat," "companion" 
or "friend" as opposed to "nigger," 
then the rhythmic presentation is off. 
That rhythmic language is a form of 
historical memory for black people. 


It's how black people talk. It's like 
saying "y'all" if you're from Georgia. 
When you hear that, it resonates with 
you if vou grew up in Georgia. With, 
say, 85 percent of black people com- 
ing out of the South over the past 50 
years, certain ways of speaking—just 
like ways of singing—connect with 
you and in some ways empower you. 
Nigger as part of the rhythmic lan- 
guage and cultural way of life is hard 
to eliminate because it's not just a 
political issue; it’s experiential, cul- 
tural. Very few people get that, but 
that's real. When Richard Pryor came 
back from Africa and decided to stop 
using that word onstage, he would 
sometimes start to slip up because he 
was so used to speaking that way. It 
was the right word at that moment to 
keep the rhythm together in his sen- 
tence making. 

PLAYBOY: In a few recent instances we've 
noticed newspapers are substituting 
"the N word" for “nigger,” even when 
discussing it in a news context. Despite 
your call for a moratorium on the word, 
aren't there situations when the term is 
necessary in public discourse? 

WEST: In an artistic setting—it could 
be Huckleberry Finn by the genius 
Samuel Clemens, or it could be 2 Pac's 
music—I think you have to use the 
word because the artist is making a 


point and the word is part of the point. In 
newspapers it's a little different because 
many people view it as a term of disre- 


spect or outright attack. This is true of 


any people's words. Italians have their 
words, Jews have their words, Mexicans 
have their words—words of disrespect and 
dishonor—and I don't think the prolifera- 
tion of those kinds of words in newspapers 


is a positive thing. It's just a matter of 


respecting folk. In that sense, I can under- 
stand why a newspaper would not use the 
word. That would be true of gay brothers 
and lesbian sisters and the words used to 
put them down as well. 

PLAYBOY: That's an interesting parallel, since 
the word queer has also been transformed 
from an insult into a badge of 
honor or camaraderie. 

WEST: Within the gay community 
it has, but I don't think it's a mass 
movement among straights in 
terms of the use of that word. 


ANY WORD 


THAT'S USED TO 


FORUM 


cissistic, hedonistic and misogynist qualities 
you have criticized in mainstream hip- 
hop—draws primarily white audiences. 
For a moment it looked as if Kanye West 
might be capable of fusing that scene with 
the more commercial—and black—main- 
stream hip-hop world, but now it seems 
West was an anomaly rather than the 
beginning of a trend. Since you worked 
with a lot of artists from this indie scene, 
what did you pick up about conscious rap- 
pers' hopes for more commercial success, 
and do you think your clout in the black 
community can help the process? 

west: Somebody like Common sells in the 
hundreds of thousands and is very con- 
scious. Rhymefest is very organic; he's 
deeply linked to the black com- 
munity. But it's hard for the 
conscious hip-hop artist to see 
center stage in the black com- 
munity. Then you have progres- 
sive white brothers and sisters 


But of course the F word, the DEGRADE who support so many conscious 
word faggot, is still a word of dis- hip-hop artists. I'd like to bring 
honor and disrespect in the OUGHT TO BE them all together. I don't want 
straight community even though to think too highly of my clout, 
some gay brothers may take that HELD AT ARM'S but my public lectures tend to 
word and try to reverse it. I think be very multiracial. 

that word ought to have the LENGTH. PLAYBOY: You've talked about 


same status as the N word. Any 

word that's used to degrade and 

disrespect any slice of the community ought 
to be held at arm's length in newspapers. 
PLAYBOY: In your song "N-Word" you 
clear Talib Kweli to use the word nigger 
because of his "high spiritual develop- 
ment." How can people figure out who 
should be allowed to use the word, and 
who is a legitimate arbiter of that right? 
WEST: For me the bottom line is more self- 
respect, more self-regard, more love, more 
self-confidence. If we can use any words to 
get more love and 
self-respect, I'm for 
it. When Talib uses 
nigger it’s clear he 
has such a deep 
love and respect for 
black people that 
it's different from 
brother Michael 
Richards saying it 
or Don Imus using 
similar words. 
PLAYBOY: Are you 
suggesting the word is too dangerous 
except for an intellectual elite? 

west: The intellectual elite has no 
monopoly on love and self-respect. A 
lot of times it's the opposite. If Clarence 
Thomas used the word nigger, I'd figure 
he was putting me down. And he's about 
as elite as you can get. 

PLAYBOY: The indie hip-hop scene—posi- 
tive or "conscious" rap eschewing the nar- 


West on a panel with Russell Simmons and P Diddy. 


this album as a danceable educa- 

tion, and you also speak about 
the political origins of hip-hop. But in look- 
ing at the history of hip-hop, it often seems 
the extent to which it was an alternative 
forum for political discourse is overblown. 
How would you counter the suggestion that 
hip-hop started out as just party music? 
west: When I talk about the origins of hip- 
hop, I'm thinking about Bambaataa and 
DJ Kool Herc and then connecting that to 
Kurtis Blow, KRS-One, and Chuck D and 
Public Enemy. Now, Sugarhill Gang ain't 
nothing but fun— 
which is fine; fun 
plays an important 
role—but with guys 
like DJ Kool Herc 
and Grandmaster 
Flash, the fun is 
fused with a certain 
kind of wrestling 
with your situation. 
There are forms of 
fun—such as being 
at the Holiday 
Inn and all that—that are just a weekend 
moment. But if you are dealing with the 
realities of your life, the Holiday Inn is just 
the weekend and Monday you're going to 
work. Hip-hop in its first substantive wave 
embraced all that. It's about New York City 
and some serious realities people there were 
wrestling with. It's a matter of fusing the fun 
and the funk, as well as having a purpose. 
And that’s what our album is about, too. 


MARGINALIA 


FROM A TRANS- 
LATION of a speech 
by Osama bin Laden 

in The Al Qaeda Reader, 
this passage concerns the way 
President George W. Bush's use of 
us-vs.-them language in defining the 
struggle against terrorists validates Bin 
Laden's own philosophy: "Bush 
divided the world into two: ‘either with 
us or with terrorism.' The odd thing 
about this is that he has taken the 
words right out of our mouths." 


FROM AN 
ANSWER by 
William Reid of 
the band the ү; 
Jesus and Mary 
Chain to a ques- Ы 
tion in Uncut 
magazine about 
what it's like to 
live in the U.S. 
after years of 
criticizing it: 
“It's like a wonderfully prosperous 
third world country. It's a great place 
to live, but it's got a dark side." 


FROM A CATALOG description of a 
camouflage Bible cover at 4outdoorsmen 
.com: "The front is embroidered with 
the Christian Outdoorsman logo and 
the slogan ‘Hunting for God’ with Bible 
reference Psalm 42:1: ‘As the deer 
pants for streams of water, so my soul 
pants for you, O God.' The fabric is a 
heavy-duty water-resistant nylon. The 
Christian Outdoorsman logo was de- 
signed to be legible but blend in so that 
this camo Bible cover can be used in 
the field, as well as taken to church.” 


FROM A COMPLAINT by Michael 
Moore, on his website, about a CNN 
piece analyzing his movie Sicko that 
had as its lone guest expert Paul 
Keckley, identified by the network's 
Sanjay Gupta as affiliated with Vander- 
bilt University: “Keckley loft Vanderbilt 
in October 2006 to become the execu- 
tive director of the Deloitte Center for 
Health Solutions. The independent 
chairman of the Deloitte Center for 
Health Solutions is Tommy Thompson, 
who was George W. Bush’s Health and 
Human Services secretary from 2001 
to 2005 and is currently running for 
president as a Republican. Keckley has 
made large contributions to Republican 
candidates and organizations. He gave 
$1,000 to GOP Senator Bob Corker in 
2006, $1,000 to the Tennessee GOP 
in 2002, along with $1,500 to two GOP 
congressional candidates and $1,000 
to the Tennessee GOP in 2000. Keckley 
was also the CEO and founder of EBM 
Solutions Inc. of Nashville, Tennessee, 
which counted among its customers 
Blue Cross of Tennes- 
see, the drug company 
Aventis and others. 
Considering Keckley 
makes his living 7 
in the for-profit 
health care 
world—a world 
(continued on 


page 47) 


STRAIGHT-TALK EXPRESS 
In the August “Reader Response” 
Tim Johnson writes about the atrocity 
that has taken place with the Supreme 
Court's ruling on late-term abortion. I 
am so tired of this debate. First, both 


pro-lifers and pro-choicers are guilty of 


playing people. This issue is not "choice" 
or "life" —who would ever be antichoice 
or antilife? The issue at hand is abor- 
tion, specifically whether a fetus should 
be given the rights of an infant. It has 
nothing to do with women's rights, If we 
decided, through either a metaphysi- 
cal argument or scientific evidence, that 
a fetus possessed the rights accorded a 
newborn, then abortion would be illegal 
regardless of the fact that a fetus occupies 


a woman's uterus. On the other hand, if 


we decided a fetus is nothing more than 
a cluster of cells, then by all means go 
ahead and remove it as you would a can- 


The media don't correct slick rhetoric. 


cerous tumor. I cannot believe the debate 
has been allowed to go on this long with 
such shameful, slick rhetoric. 

Brett McGinnis 

West Chester, Pennsylvania 


NUKE, NUKE, NUKE 

No doubt The Playboy Forum lent its soap- 
box to James Lovelock and Stewart Brand 
to promote nuclear power (“Greens for 
Nukes” and "Environmentalism's New 
World Order,” July) for the novelty value 
of ostensible environmentalists advocat- 
ing an energy source that emits a toxic, 
planet-killing by-product. Illuminating 
and refuting the sleight of hand and 
omissions of fact necessary for them to do 
so requires more space than is available in 
your letters column. Lovelock and Brand 
have lost their way and are locked into 
corporate big-think, their efforts indis- 
tinguishable from the work of PR giants 
Penn, Schoen & Berland Associates and 


FORUM 


Hill & Knowlton, which signed an $8 mil- 
lion contract with the Nuclear Energy 
Institute to "preempt and offset" criticism 


Lovelock (left) and Brand like nuclear power. 


of nuclear power. Playing into the hands 
of this campaign has put PLAYBOY'S pro- 
gressive rep in imminent peril. 
Andrew Christie 
San Luis Obispo, California 
Christie is director of the Santa Lucia, 


California chapter of the Sierra Club. 


"Greens for Nukes" could easily sway 
the uninformed. As the author is clearly 
knowledgeable about the subject, the arti- 
de amounts to deliberate disinformation. 
Lovelock states (correctly) that renew- 
able energy currently provides a small 
percentage of worldwide energy use. 
He ignores the fact that nuclear power 
provides an even smaller amount (6.3 
percent versus 6.5 percent) of worldwide 
energy than renewables (which include 
hydroelectric and geothermal power, not 
just wind and solar). He states (correctly) 
that most renewable-energy projects 
are subsidized. He ignores that every 
nuclear plant ever built was heavily if not 
entirely subsidized and that nuclear-fuel 
procurement and disposal are also sub- 
sidized. He ignores that even with those 
subsidies, nuclear power is more expen- 
sive than renewables. Also, nuclear waste 
may take up a small amount of space, but 
it lasts essentially forever. He proposes 
using nuclear weapons as a fuel source. 
A major problem with fossil fuels, global 
warming aside, is that they are a limited 
resource, as are nuclear weapons. He 
proposes spending billions on plants to 
process nukes that, at our rate of electric- 
ity consumption, could be used up in a 
few decades. Worst of all, he suggests it 
is not feasible for us to cut our power 
usage. Americans use nearly 10 times 
more energy per capita than the world 


average, including the rest of the first 
world. That amounts to roughly a quarter 
of the world's energy being consumed by 
about five percent of the world's popula- 
tion. Obviously it is more than possible to 
live comfortably without using the elec- 
tricity and petroleum we do here. 
Kafele Bakari 
Oakland, California 


I find it laughable that Lovelock and 
Brand claim it is time for environmen- 
talists to embrace nuclear energy. They 
fail to mention that decentralized solar 
photovoltaic technology is already out- 
pacing nuclear as an alternative energy 
source for this century, mainly because 
of its lack of maintenance and radioactive 
by-products, as well as its modularity, ver- 
satility and efficiency. Centralized power 
generation is out; self-suffictency and inde- 
pendent power generation are the buzzwords 
for the 21st century energy scene. 

Caleb White 
Denton, Texas 


Thank you, thank you, thank you for 
finally sharing the truth about nuclear 
power. For too long the public has been 
afraid of this technology because of 
nuclear weapons and the Chernobyl 


How realistic are renewables? 


and Three Mile Island incidents. They 
fail to see that nuclear power is safe and 
is our best chance in this rapidly dete- 
riorating world. As a young engineer, 
I find it frustrating to see all the mis- 
conceptions people have. Our world is 
going to be a very different place sooner 
than we think; let us hope we wake up 
in time to save some of it. 

Ben Woolley 

East Norwalk, Connecticut 


E-mail vía the web at letters.playboy.com. Or 
write: 730 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10019. 


FORUM 


NEWSFRONT 


Northern Exposure 


CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS—Chastity clubs, which 
have proliferated at Southern colleges for years, 
are now beginning to appear on the campuses 
of Northern liberal-arts schools. Sarah Kinsella 
and Justin Murray, a Harvard undergraduate 
couple, founded True Love Revolution there last 
year, and similar organizations have started at 
Princeton and MIT, where members are asked 
to sign a pledge stating, “ commit myself 
to make an effort to live a chaste lifestyle. A 
chaste lifestyle involves using the gift of my 
body honorably and respectfully." Kinsella and 
Murray met at a Catholic student association, 
and despite avoiding religious references, their 
club—as well as the others—uses the predict- 
able language of antifemale fundamentalism, 
equating “dignity,” “self-respect” and “empow- 
erment” with women denying themselves sex. 
Harvard's club even sent out Valentine's Day 
cards to every female freshman, inscribed with 
the message “Celebrate love, celebrate life, cel- 
ebrate you: Why wait? Because you're worth 
it." From where we're standing, it's tough to 
think of anything more loving, life-affirming and 
fulfilling than sex—and that certainly applies to 
women as much as to men. 


Chronic Defenders 


WASHINGTON, D.C.—The FBI has revised its rules 
concerning drug use among applicants. For 
the past 13 years anyone who admitted to 
having used marijuana more than 15 times 
was barred from being hired. Now, as part 
of an effort to hire hundreds of new agents 
and analysts, that number has been thrown 


Fashion Police 


BANGKoK—In an effort to discourage 
professional-rules violations among its 
officers, a division of the city police 
force instituted a policy requiring that 
cops who litter, show up late for work 
or park illegally wear a pink Hello Kitty 
armband as punishment. (The depart- 
ment has since decided to use a Thai 
cartoon character to avoid legal trouble 
from the Japanese Kitty.) “This new twist 
is expected to make them feel guilt and 
shame and prevent them from repeating 
the offense, no matter how minor," said 
Pongpat Chayaphan, acting chief of the 
division. “Kitty is a cute icon for young 
girls. It's not something macho police of- 
ficers want covering their biceps." Chay- 
aphan, who trained with the U.S. Secret 
Service and Canadian police prior to his 
promotion, is seeking low-tech, low-cost 
ways to modernize his force. 


out and described by Jeff Berkin, deputy di- 
rector of the bureau's security division, as 
“arbitrary.” Speaking after word of the policy 
change had seeped out to the public (there 
was no official announcement of its Janu- 
ary installation), Berkin also said applicants 
had trouble remembering exactly how many 
times they had smoked when asked about 
the 15-times rule during polygraph tests. 


Wire Cutters 


cHicaco—The issue of 
Net neutrality took cen- 
ter stage during a web 
broadcast of Pearl Jam's 
Lollapalooza set when 
AT&T, the broadcaster, 
muted the sound. Eddie 
Vedder was singing varia- 
tions on Pink Floyd's "Another Brick in the Wall," 
including the line "George Bush, leave this world 
alone," at which point AT&T's content monitor 
cut the sound, not allowing listeners to hear 
the subsequent line, "George Bush, find your- 
self another home." While this may not seem 
important, Pearl Jam, on its website, explained 
why it is: "Most telecommunications companies 
oppose 'Net neutrality' and argue that the public 
can trust them not to censor. If a company that 
is controlling a webcast is cutting out bits of our 
performance—not based on laws but on their 
own preferences and interpretations—fans have 
little choice but to watch the censored version. 
What happened to us this weekend was a wake- 
up call, and it's about something much bigger 
than the censorship of a rock band." 


MARGINALIA 


(continued from page 45) 


Sicko argues should be abolished— 
viewers should have been told exactly 
where Keckley was coming from." 


FROM A 
TRANSLATION 
of the text on a 
Japanese mural 
that depicts a 
cartoon version 
of the Statue of 
Liberty, included 
in a new book 
about Japanese 
logos called Helio, 
Please, by Matt 
Alt and Hiroko Yoda: “Stop illegal immi- 
gration by reporting suspicious activity!" 


FROM AN INTERVIEW on 

The New York Times' freakonomics blog 
with Sudhir Venkatesh, author of Gang 
Leader for a Day, to be published next 
year: “Many gang members who attain 
leadership status are deeply 

conscious of their perception by wider 
society. They tend to make two argu- 
ments when discussing their behavior: 
first, that whites also work in the 
underground economy but are not pros- 
ecuted (or stigmatized) to the same 
degree (just look at the differential rates 
of punishment for powder cocaine and 
crack cocaine—the former is distributed 
by whites to a far greater degree); and 
second, that corporations also engage 
in criminal activity but are rarely 
viewed as outlaws—not just Enron but 
oil and other companies that have 
established histories of supporting 
antidemocratic regimes in developing 
countries to secure their own profits. 
Now, you could say that these analogies 
are bogus and boki-faced rationalizations, 
and | would agree to some degree. 

But it is important to look at the world 
from the perspective of the gang mem- 
ber—who sees everyone as a hustler." 


FROM AN EDITORIAL by 

Dahlia Lithwick on Slate.com about 
congressional Democrats' willingness, 
through their changes to the Foreign 
Intelligence Surveillance Act in August, 
to grant new spying powers to the 
attorney general's office even as they 
questioned the integrity of the current 
occupant, Alberto Gonzales: "With 
this FISA vote the Democrats have 
compromised the investigation into the 
U.S. attorney scandal. They've shown 
themselves to be either participating in 
an empty 
political 
witch 
hunt or 
curiously 
willing 

to sur- 
render 
our civil 
liberties to someone who has shown— 
time and again—that he cannot be 
trusted to safeguard them. The image 
of Democrats hypocritically berating the 
attorney general with fingers crossed 
behind their backs is ultimately no 

less appalling than an attorney general 
swearing to uphold the Constitution 
with fingers crossed behind his own." 


47 


FORUM 


THREAT ASSESSMENT 


THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA TREAT INEPT TERROR ATTACKS LIKE GRAVE 
THREATS. A LOOK AT IRA BOMBINGS PROVIDES PERSPECTIVE 


he destructive potential of car bombs rigged in 

| Glasgow and London this past summer was described 
in hyperbolic language: "maximum damage," "car- 
nage," "slaughter" and "horror." But gasoline and nails 
used in such rudimentary bombs would not have caused 
widespread damage even if they had all gone off. A com- 
parison of these recent attempts to the sophisticated attacks 


^. Lord Mountbatten, Queen 
Elizabeth II's cousin, was killed 
while yachting off County Sligo 
Ireland in 1979, when IRA mem- 
bers blew up his boat. The same 
day, 18 British soldiers were 
killed in County Down 


orchestrated by various parts of the IRA in prior decades 
highlights the lack of efficacy of many current terrorists— 
and the irresponsibility of TV journalists, for whom all 
threats are apparently equal. The IRA detonated bombs 
of more than 3,000 pounds—destroying an entire mall in 
Manchester in 1996, for instance—and on several occa- 
sions came close to killing top British political leaders. 


A i 
‚made of plastic explosives, the 
all gasoline-based, 


4 in 1984 a bomb planted in the Grand 
Hotel in Brighton, site of the Tory Party con- 
vention, narrowly missed then prime minister 
Margaret Thatcher. Using a mortar set up in 
a van that later caught fire, the IRA launched 
shells onto the grounds of 10 Downing 
Street, the British equivalent of the White 
House, during a cabinet meeting in 1991. w 


4 Canary Wharf was 
bombed in 1996, caus- 
ing £85 million in dam- 
ages. The IRA was using 
1,000-pound bombs as 
early as 1979 


PLAYBOY INTERVIEW: ROBERT REDFORD 


A candid conversation with the iconic actor-director about why he likes fi 


fas t 


cars, hybrids and Paul Newman and doesn't like George Bush or the press 


What’s remarkable about Robert Redford 
after all this time—and he has been famous 
for nearly five decades—is that he's still 
something of a mystery. He rarely gives 
interviews, and he manages to stay above 
gossip at a time when every 14-year-old with 
a cell phone is a paparazzo. 

What we do know is that Redford defies 
easy categorization. Celebrated for his golden 
good looks, he always rejected the role of pretty 
boy. An intensely private man, he has dedi- 
cated his life to public causes. And though 
he's a wealthy Hollywood insider known for 
blockbusters like Butch Cassidy and the Sun- 
dance Kid, The Sting and All the President's 
Men, Redford's lasting legacy may well be his 
commitment to scrappy independent film. 

At 71, with a face cragged from a lifetime 
on ski slopes and sunny back lots, Redford isn't 
showing signs of losing his complexity. This 
winter he's taking on an unpopular admin- 
istration by releasing a drama full of popular 
names (Streep, Cruise and, yes, Redford, who 
also stars). Lions for Lambs, set in Washington, 
D.C. and Afghanistan, is Redford's 38th film as 
an actor and his sixth at the helm since winning 
his only Oscar, for directing Ordinary People. 

But moviemaking is now practically a 
sideline for Redford, whose acting and 
directing efforts have mostly sputtered since 
long-ago hits like The Natural, Out of Africa 
and A River Runs Through It. (He has 


fared better in recent years as a producer 
of such films as The Motorcycle Diaries.) 
From his mountain home on 6,000 acres 
outside Park City, Utah, the still sandy- 
haired icon plays don to a worldwide mob of 
indie auteurs whose reason for being is the 
annual Sundance Film Festival, Founded in 
1981, Redford's Sundance Institute and the 
festival have become the recognized ways to 
buck the Hollywood establishment. Steven 
Soderbergh, Quentin Tarantino, Robert 
Rodriguez and Jim Jarmusch all screened 
their breakthrough films to the Ugg-booted 
hipsters there. And Redford has since spun 
the brand, named for his own career-making 
role opposite pal Paul Newman, into a small 
empire. There's the 24-hour Sundance 
Channel, a Sundance housewares cata- 
log and an expanding chain of Sundance 
Cinemas. This year's festival drew 48,000 
attendees, some of whom actually came to 
see the movies. To counter the increasingly 
zoo-like atmosphere, Redford's institute dis- 
tributed pins reading FOCUS ON FILM. 
Redford, who's divorced and has three 
grown children and four grandchildren, is 
just as focused on politics and the future of the 
planet. Decades before every Hollywood star 
drove a hybrid, Redford became a trustee of 
the Natural Resources Defense Council, a base 
he has used to push for cleaner air and water 
and alternative-energy production. He has 


frequently narrated eco-themed films and com- 
mercials, and last year the Sundance Channel 
premiered The Green, a series of programs and 
documentaries devoted to environmental issues. 
He has also spent much of the past six years 
railing against the policies—environmental 
and otherwise—of the Bush administration. 

Born in Santa Monica, California in 1936, 
Charles Robert Redford Jr. was a restless kid. 
His father was a milkman and later an oil- 
company accountant; his mother died young 
from cancer. In high school Redford stole hub- 
caps and hiked more than he studied. Later 
he lost his baseball scholarship at the Univer- 
sity of Colorado for drinking (and skiing and 
painting) too much. Afler a starving-artist 
stint in Europe, he found his way to New York, 
where his curiosity about set design led him 
to the American Ас ademy of Dramatic Arts. 
Too good-looking for stage crew, Redford was 
soon landing parts on Broadway, where his 
charisma in Neil Simon's Barefoot in the Park 
(1963) got Hollywood's attention, and he has 
been an international star ever since. 

Writer David Hochman met Redford at the 
actor's vacation home in Napa Valley. (His 
primary address has been Utah since 1970.) 
Says Hochman, "Redford is notorious for 
being late, even though he keeps his watch set 
half an hour ahead. True to form, he pushed 
the interview time to the 11th hour, but once 
we sat doum he couldn't stop talking. Redford 


“I never trusted success. I come from a long 
line of people who thought if something good 
happens to you, there must be something 
wrong. It never interested me to do Leno or 
go to parties, and I think that served me." 


"I drive hybrid cars. Гое had passive solar 
heating and wind generation in my Utah 
home since 1975. But I must say, I do like 
racing fast cars. It's a hypocritical, weak move 
on my part. But l've always loved speed." 


PHOTOGRAPHY BY MARK EDWARD HARRIS 


"I gave up a long time ago the idea that a 
film can change people's lives, let alone their 
politics. I discovered we Americans enjoy the 
distraction of entertainment but aren't really 
interested in the deeper message." 


49 


PLAY FOF 


50 


looks older and softer around the middle 
than he did in the days of The Sting and The 
Great Gatsby, but at one point he donned a 
pair of gold aviator sunglasses and lit up 
that legendary smile. All you can think is, 
Good God! It's Robert Redford!" 


PLAYBOY: You've been enormously suc- 
cessful for almost 50 years without a 
major scandal or a real drop in your 
esteem. In fact, as you've gotten older, 
you've become more revered. How on 
earth is that possible? 

REDFORD: Probably because I never trusted 
success. I come from a long line of people 
who thought if something good happens 
to you, there must be something wrong. 
Early on, when movies like Butch Cassidy 
put a huge spotlight on me, I 
ran from it. I never fell into the 
traps of having an entourage 
and being surrounded by yes- 
people. It never interested me 
to do Leno or go to parties, and 
I think that served me. 
PLAYBOY: Can you imagine 
starting out in today's celebrity- 
crazed environment? 

REDFORD: I'm glad I don't have 
to. Today more than ever, I see 
young actors going into the busi- 
ness of themselves. They find 
some commercial hook and they 
play it out. You see them doing 
every magazine cover, every TV 
show. I think that's a mistake. 
One of the benefits of growing 
up in L.A. was that Hollywood 
wasn't the end of my rainbow, As 
a kid, I would see famous actors 
and say, "Oh shit, that person is 
bald" or whatever. Furthermore, 
I always benefited from having 
interests outside L.A. I felt it was 
important to be in Utah, to raise 
my kids there. It was grounding 
for them and for me. I came to 
see Hollywood as a place where 
I could make social statements 
under the guise of entertain- 
ment—and then get out. 
PLAYBOY: Lions for Lambs is the 
latest in a long series of politi- 
cal movies for you that started 
with The Candidate in 1972. Is your 
intention to somehow influence public 
opinion or policy? 

REDFORD: I gave up a long time ago the 
idea that a film can change people's 
lives, let alone their politics. I once 
had great hopes that people would 
see movies like The Candidate or All the 
President's Men and say, "Hey, if we're 
not careful, we might get snookered.” 
I discovered we Americans enjoy the 
distraction of entertainment but aren't 
really interested in the deeper message. 
We don't like to look inward; we don't 
like darkness. For me The Candidate is a 
movie about hypocrisy in politics, about 
how it's all dominated by cosmetics 
and dressing well. But l'll never forget, 


years later, Dan Quayle saying that was 
the movie that got him into politics. I 
thought, Boy, did he miss the point! 
The one exception in terms of influ- 
encing people was always fashion. When 
we were doing Butch Cassidy, 1 wanted to 
wear a mustache, but they were out of 
style. My agent was against it. I was told 
stories about actors whose entire careers 
were ruined by mustaches. And I said, 
"That's crap." After the movie hit, mus- 
taches were everywhere. 
PLAYBOY: A mustache might have been 
a good idea for Tom Cruise in Lions for 
Lambs, given the public's reaction to him 
lately. As his co-star and director, are you 
worried about all that negative attention? 
REDFORD: Tom's a talented actor, and I 


Environmental activism isn't 
about being trendy. There's some- 
thing shallow about that. 


think people still respond positively to 
him. This is an especially interesting 
role for him because he plays a young 
Republican who's sort of a better ver- 
sion of Bush. He's smarter. He went to 
Harvard and West Point, not to Yale on 
a pass. The concern for me was whether 
Tom was up for playing a character like 
that, and he definitely was. I didn't con- 
cern myself with the gossip—I never 
do—and I knew enough from what Гуе 
been through to judge the man based 
on what I experience firsthand. And I 
didn't see any behavior on the film that 
troubled me. Really. 

PLAYBOY: A producer like Jerry Bruck- 
heimer has no trouble getting access 
to military vehicles and government 


locations for his movies. Is that process 
harder on a Robert Redford film because 
of your liberal reputation? 

REDFORD: I can only speculate, but I sus- 
pect it is. For the new film, I wanted a 
shot of Meryl Streep, who plays a vet- 
eran political journalist, coming down 
the steps of the Russell Senate Office 
Building in Washington. I was initially 
told it wasn't a problem. Word finally got 
back that the head of security wanted to 
speak to me directly. Directly? I thought 
that was odd. He ended up telling me 
no, which seemed to give him a certain 
amount of pleasure. Then when our pro- 
duction designer inquired about taking 
measurements inside the building so we 
could re-create it for our sets—not an 
uncommon request—we started 
hearing questions like “Is this 
that Redford movie?" The tone 
of the question suggested it 
would be some sort of lefty pic- 
ture, as if I were going to shoot 
down the whole building. In the 
end, we put in a call to Barack 
Obama, and he made it possible 
to get what we needed. 
PLAYBOY: You kicked off this 
year's Sundance Festival by 
demanding an apology from 
President Bush for the war in 
Iraq. It's nearly a year later. 
Have you heard from him yet? 
REDFORD: The situation is worse 
now. It's worse than Nixon, 
worse than Vietnam, worse than 
McCarthy. But it's the same pat- 
tern, the same sensibility that 
caused it. You have a leader 
who's mean, myopic, tyrannical, 
obsessed with power and willing 
to make criminal mistakes. You 
can take almost every area of 
our society—health, the envi- 
ronment, the military, jobs— 
and this administration has 
savaged it for one percent of 
the American population. I feel 
anger and hurt for the loss of 
the country I once knew. What's 
amazing is the Republicans— 
with control of both houses, the 
Supreme Court and the bully 
pulpit—had every opportunity to move 
the country ahead, and look what they've 
done in just six years. You begin to won- 
der, Are we just another empire, like the 
Ottoman or the Roman, that crashes and 
burns because of hubris? It's not going 
to be easy to undo what these guys have 
done to us. But there's always hope, and 
my hope has always been in art. 
PLAYBOY: When you received the Ken- 
nedy Center Honor in 2005, Presi- 
dent Bush called you "extraordinarily 
handsome, effortlessly fascinating and 
enormously talented." Was it difficult to 
shake his hand? 

REDFORD: It was tough, but you have 
to shake his hand. You go through the 
motions because everybody's taking the 


high road. I was assured beforehand that 
this was an honor above politics, and I 
said, "If that's the case, okay, ГИ have 
to bite it.” It really was about my fam- 
ily and giving my kids and especially my 
grandkids a chance to see firsthand how 
a place like the White House operates, 
and boy, they saw it all right. 

PLAYBOY: What happened? 

REDFORD: What we observed that night was 
mind-bending. Here were sworn enemies, 
the leaders who beat the shit out of each 
other all day in public, but the minute 
those doors closed for the state dinner, 
the daggers went away and it was one big 
happy family. Condoleezza Rice got up 
and couldn't have been sweeter or more 
gracious; she was smiling at everyone. I 
thought, This is so bizarre. Then I saw for- 
mer Republican senator Bill Frist weaving 
through the tables, and he came over to 
Ted Kennedy and started massaging his 
shoulders and laughing like they were the 
oldest buddies in the world. Everybody 
was crossing the aisles and chuckling, 
and I said, "Oh, I get it! It really is just 
a game." They have to go out and say, “I 
represent so-and-so and such-and-such a 
platform," but it's absolute total bullshit. 
PLAYBOY: Are you ever ashamed to be 
an American? 

REDFORD: I'm not ashamed. I'm sad. I'm 
angry. I'm sad to be an American caught 
in à minority sensibility in this country. 
But I think it will swing back. It always 
does. The real question, particularly 
when it comes to the environment, is 
when we have a Nero—and that's what 
Bush is—how many resources do we 
have to play with before they all run out? 
How much damage can he do? 
PLAYBOY: Looking at Governor Arnold 
Schwarzenegger, do you ever think, I 
should be doing that? 

REDFORD: Every film about politics I've 
made makes the point that politics com- 
promises you. Your hands are tied, and 
I would never want to be in that posi- 
tion, so no. I lost all interest in going into 
politics around the time the Watergate 
break-in occurred. I was promoting The 
Candidate, and I did a whistle-stop train 
tour with George McGovern and some 
other candidates. I wanted to make the 
point that I could draw more people just 
by standing on the back of the train. And 
that's what happened. They would draw 
300 or 400 people, then I would go out 
and get 3,000 or 4,000. I would tell the 
crowds, "Thank you all for coming. My 
fellow Americans, I just want you all to 
know I have absolutely nothing impor- 
tant to say." And they would cheer. 
PLAYBOY: Which presidential candidate 
excites you most now? 

REDFORD: There isn't one. In terms of sup- 
port, I try not to involve myself in national 
politics. I realize you have much more 
influence on the local stage. There's so 
much constipation on the national front, 
but things can shift locally. I don't agree 
with everything Mayor Richard Daley has 


done, but he's done amazing things with 
the environment in Chicago, and I can 
support that. 

PLAYBOY: 15 it a sign of progress that many 
Hollywood stars now arrive at movie pre- 
mieres in Priuses instead of limos? 
REDFORD: Honestly, it scares me. Environ- 
mental activism isn't about being trendy 
or making a fashion statement. There's 
something shallow about that. With the 
Johnny-come-latelies, you hope it's not 
just a publicity move, because people will 
grow tired of it and move on. That's not 
to say there hasn't been progress. What's 
changed is the money. The public is wak- 
ing up to this and buying the green move- 
ment. Corporate America is finally saying 
you can be both profitable and environ- 
mentally conscious. That's something 
we've been waiting for since the 1960s. 
What Al Gore's been doing couldn't have 
happened without corporate funding. 
Unfortunately, it took the escalation of 
global threats to make that happen, and 
now we need more than stars showing up 
in hybrids and organic cotton. If public 
enthusiasm wanes, the blue-chip backing 
will disappear, and then where will we 
be? We need more funding. We need new 
green technologies, like the ones coming 
out of Silicon Valley. We need real action. 
PLAYBOY: Granted, but we notice you don't 
have those squiggly bulbs in all your light 
fixtures. How green are you exactly? 
REDFORD: I'm not Ed Begley Jr., though I 
think he’s amazing. I'm not that extreme. 
But I drive hybrid cars. Гуе had passive 
solar heating and wind generation in my 
Utah home since 1975. I bike and hike 
and ride horses as much as I can. But I 
must say, I do like racing fast cars. 
PLAYBOY: How do you rationalize that? 
REDFORD: Guilty as charged, I'm afraid. 
It's a hypocritical, weak move on my part. 
We do what we can. But I've always loved 
speed. I love finding a good stretch of 
open road and cutting loose in my Porsche. 
That's all I want to say about that. 
PLAYBOY: Do you ever get caught? 
REDFORD: [Laughs slyly} That's often the 
interesting part. I was blasting through an 
Indian reservation one time in northern 
New Mexico, and the reservation cop took 
a long time giving me a ticket. I looked in 
the mirror, and the place was alive with 
cop cars. I think the entire Apache nation 
turned up, and they all wanted a picture 
with me, down to the last secretary. 
PLAYBOY: When did that sort of thing start 
happening to you? 

REDFORD: Things started getting hairy 
around the time I did Barefoot in the 
Park on Broadway in 1963. I lived a 
pretty anonymous life before that, but 
suddenly everything was supercharged. 
One day in New York I had some busi- 
ness in a building on the west side, and 
some nursing-school students got wind 
I was there. Somebody came up and 
said, "The nursing gals are freaking 
out. You have to exit through the base- 
ment," And I remember being down 


Action! Heroes 


It's not easy to work both sides of 
the camera. Here are the best 
actor-directors on-screen today 


— —2—Ek.„3!l. ZI cransrr... 


Dirty Horry is memorable, but the gen- 
tle power of Clint Eastwood's recent 
films such as Let- 
ters From lwo 
Jima has moved 
critics. He is one 
of only three liv- 
ing directors to 
have made two — 

films that Won — 
Academy Awards for best picture (Un- 
forgiven and Million Dollar Baby). Not 
bad for a man with no name. 


Oh, Mel Gibson, Apocalypto and 
Braveheart are we but The 
Passion of the 
Christ is a little 
freaky. Very pas- 
sionate about 
his subjects, the 
devout Catho- 
lic has said his 
Episcopalian 
wife may not get into heaven: "She's 
a saint, but that is a pronouncement 
from the chair. | go with it.” Yikes, 


It's tough for Kevin Smith to be vain 
about his success as an actor and studio 


diredor when the syo 
press continues > | 7 

to label him an E. 

indie filmmaker. . 
(He made Jersey - шы... 
Girl for а report- ( E ` 
ed $35 million.) 4 

Vanity, though, is 

not one of Smith's traits: He recast him- 
self in Clerks Il as Silent Bob, a central 
character with the fewest lines. 


Zach Braff is no scrub; critics loved 
his feature directorial debut, Garden 
State. His act- 
ing and direct- 
ing were both 
impressive, and 
he also compiled 
the Grammy- 
winning sound- 
track, which 
indudes the Shins, Iron and Wine, Frou 
Frou and, unfortunately, Coldplay. 


Kevin Costner won an Oscar for 
his debut behind the camera with 
Dances With Wolves but stumbled 
in his next at- 
tempt, The Post- 
man. His fourth 
directing effort, 


Open Range, xal 
put him back 


in critics’ good й A 
graces—it was 2 , т 
also the first film he directed for 

which he didn't give himself top bill- 
ing. Coincidence? —Rocky Rakovic 


53 


PFLAYEOT 


54 


there, hearing this thunder of footsteps 
overhead. I got out to the street, and 
there was a wall of nurses. They wanted 
every piece of me. They started clawing 
at my hair and my clothes. If not for a 
helpful taxi driver, I would have been 
torn apart by nurses, 

PLAYBOY: That doesn't sound totally 
unpleasant. 

REDFORD: The excess attention always 
made me uncomfortable. I never liked 
feeling it was all about my looks. You 
want to be seen for what you can do, not 
for your hair or your blue eyes or your 
teeth. The golden-boy thing became a 
screen in front of everything else, and 
that really worried me. It felt threat- 
ening. Suddenly your looks bring up 
resentment. You 
start to represent 
something to people 
that has nothing to 
do with who vou 
are. That's not to 
say I wasn't enjoy- 
ing success, I was 
enjoying parts of it 
immensely. 

PLAYBOY: Can you give 
us a sense of what it 
was like to be Rob- 
ert Redford in those 
days? Were you hang- 
ing out with Elvis and 
people like that? 
REDFORD: I was Elvis 
in a way. It was abso- 
lute insanity. Once 
the money started 
coming in I could do 
anything I wanted, I 
could have a house 
in Connecticut in 
addition to an apart- 
ment in New York. At 
a moment's notice we 
could fly to the Carib- 
bean. We could go 
out to Trader Vic's for 
dinner every night if 
we wanted. 

PLAYBOY: Were drugs 
or alcohol ever a 
problem? 

REDFORD: No. I tried 
everything, but I never struggled. For 
me, it was a very exciting time, though 
I wasn't thinking that specifically, I was 
doing what I wanted to do. People talk 
about the 1970s now. I was just living my 
life, I was able to make films that were 
slightly off the street—Doumhill Racer, Jer- 
emiah Johnson, Three Days of the Condor— 
and those movies were being funded by 
popular films like The Great Gatsby. But as 
good as success was, there were dark sides 
to it I couldn't have imagined. 

PLAYBOY: Like stalkers? 

REDFORD: Stalkers, people hounding 
you and sneaking through bushes, On 
my birthday one year, we were on the 
property in Utah and some woman 


came down out of the trees. She was 
stark naked and carrying a cake, walking 
toward the house. They led her away, but 
there was always another girl. Sometimes 
I don't know how I survived, but I really 
don't know how the younger generation 
of actors—Brad Pitt, Tom Cruise and 
everybody on down—survive, since it's a 
thousand times more intense. 

PLAYBOY: Not to alarm you, but do you 
realize you're as old now as Will Geer 
was when he played the ornery old coot 
in Jeremiah Johnson? 

REDFORD: Jesus, really? Man, he was 
old! [laughs] He wasn't in his 80s? Gee, 
thanks for the reminder. 

PLAYBOY: Do you feel Will Geer old? 
REDFORD: I hope this doesn't sound false, but 


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I don't think about age. It's interesting that 
other people do. At a certain point I noticed 
I was being identified by my age: "Blond- 
haired, 52-year-old actor Redford...." And 
you wonder, What difference does that 
make? Well, obviously a big difference. 
PLAYBOY: Some people— Joan Rivers chief 
among them—insist you've had plastic 
surgery. Have you? 

REDFORD: No. Look at me. [laughs] I don't 
like the look of stretchiness plastic sur- 
gery gives you. It's one reason I've always 
liked European films. You see real faces. 
It's sad we feel such pressure in this cul- 
ture to maintain a certain look forever. 
I was blessed to look well and retain a 
youthful look, but that was just genes. 


I was disappointed when critics started 
pointing out my wrinkles. I thought, You 
mean this is what it's gonna be about 
now? I'm not going to be permitted to be 
human? I can't go through the natural 
changes that have faced every man since 
the dawn of time? 

PLAYBOY: Do you still get sexual attention 
from strangers? 

REDFORD: The sexual energy was always 
there, and it still is. I'm 71 years old, and I 
still get it. In a way it’s bigger now because 
it’s across the spectrum. I get it from peo- 
ple much, much younger and from older 
people—teenagers, grandmothers, great- 
grandmothers. Now it's flattering more 
than irritating, and it's not as acute; it's 
more polite, The worst period was probably 
after I made Indecent 
Proposal. Holy God, 
that one! I couldn't 
take a step outside 
without hearing 
“A million dollars 
for one night with 
your wife." If I had 
to hear "a million 
dollars" one more 
time.... 

PLAYBOY: Did any- 
body make you à 
firm offer? 
REDFORD: Yes, tons of 
firm offers. Things 
came through the 
mail. Certified. I 
could have made 
money. [laughs] 
PLAYBOY: Did that 
sort of attention 
contribute to the 
breakup of your 
marriage to Lola 
van Wagenen, the 
mother of your 
children, after 27 
years together? 
REDFORD: Yeah, 
it was hard. How 
could it not be? 
You're a human 
being, and you're 
competing with a 
ghost. You're with 
this person, but 
the person has this other side, this fame 
thing, that's not real and yet it's every- 
thing. It's huge; it’s bigger than anything 
you've ever known. But I don't think it's 
dignified to get into my marriage. There's 
nothing dark, nothing to hide. I got mar- 
ried young, at the age of 21, and it was 
good while it lasted. But you go your dif- 
ferent ways and grow out of where you 
were, I want to protect the family. 
PLAYBOY: Actors like Warren Beatty are 
well-known for their involvement with 
numerous women, but you never had 
a reputation as a philanderer. No doubt 
you could have had your pick of any 
woman, including co-stars like Natalie 
Wood and Jane Fonda. 


REDFORD: | won't comment on other 
actors. The job is hard enough with- 
out someone like me telling stories. 
But being single never appealed to me, 
and I didn't think about it much. I was 
aware there were people who lived a 
certain kind of playboy life and were 
immersed in it; I just didn't. There 
were always beautiful women around, 
of course, and I had beautiful co-stars, 
but making movies for me in those 
days was like dropping bombs behind 
enemy lines: I would do my work and 
get out of town. 

PLAYBOY: You're officially single now, 
though you appear to have a good 
thing going with your lovely compan- 
ion of eight years, Sybille Szaggars. Will 
you get married again? 

REDFORD: [Silence] 

PLAYBOY: Okay. Do you believe in marnage? 
REDFORD: It depends on the individual, 
but as a general category, no. 

PLAYBOY: Perhaps we should change the 
subject. Rumor has it you and Fidel Cas- 
tro are good buddies. 

REDFORD: Ah, Fidel. [laughs] 1 met Castro 
for the first time in 1990. Gabriel García 
Márquez had come to Sundance at my 
request to start a Spanish-speaking lab with 
Cuban filmmakers. They smuggled their 
films out of Cuba, and it was the first time 
we got any traction from outside media for 
the Sundance Institute. Afterward Gabo 
asked me to return the favor and come to 
Cuba with him. I took a tiny plane from 
Orlando to Havana, and we were set up 
in these magnificent state houses. One 
night at midnight Castro's men arrived 
unannounced, followed by Castro. He's 
a great teaser, that Fidel. He kept hitting 
my leg. "Oh, you like baseball," he said. "I 
like baseball too." He told me he loved The 
Natural, though I have no idea how he got 
a copy. After a while he decided we were 
friends and said, "Redford, you're a good 
guy. I want you to be my guest at the Cinco 
de Mayo parade." I thought, Hmmm, 
could be interesting. He started hitting my 
leg again. "You sit with me on the parade 
stand," he said, and I said, "Whoa! Wait a 
minute! I don't think so." I could imagine 
that picture getting around. 

PLAYBOY: Were you afraid it might tarnish 
your reputation among the right wing as 
a pinko, granola-crunching tree hugger? 
REDFORD: Hardly. I had already been 
burned in effigy several times. You have 
to remember, when I started speaking out 
politically in the late 1960s, actors weren't 
supposed to talk about their beliefs. The stu- 
dios certainly would have been happy if I'd 
just played romantic leads like in The Way 
We Were and kept quiet. But I couldn't keep 
quiet. As I got more successful, I realized I 
had a platform to get messages across. In 
the early 1970s I went out against a power 
plant in southern Utah and got hammered 
for it. The locals thought it would benefit 
them economically, but I saw it would totally 
destroy a big section of contiguous national 
park. I called 60 Minutes. They did a show 


on it, and the plant pulled out. The locals 
threatened my life and my family. That's 
when I realized my activism was throwing a 
net over innocent people, like my kids, and 
that made me want to retreat further. 
PLAYBOY: As if it weren't complicated 
enough for them having a dad like 
Robert Redford. 

REDFORD: | worked hard on giving my 
kids a solid foundation. That started 
with communication, encouraging them 
to speak up about things that bothered 
them, both in the family and in the 
larger world. I also spent as much time 
with them as I could. That was impor- 
tant. It helped that they grew up in both 
Utah and New York. Utah taught them 
the power of nature, which is steady, 
unlike fashion or show business, Going 
to school in New York, they learned the 
value of recognizing bullshit. As you get 
successful and famous, you start to get 
taken, even if you have radar. You have 
so much thrown at you, and it's impor- 
tant to figure out what's real and what's 
not. I'm proud to say my kids turned out 
okay. My son's a writer and producer. 
One daughter's an actress who recently 
directed a film. My oldest daughter is a 
painter and is married to Eric Schlosser, 
who wrote Fast Food Nation, so there's 
been a real uptick in their lives. 
PLAYBOY: Is it tricky having a son-in-law 
like that around when you're craving à 
Big Mac? 

REDFORD: I eat pretty healthily, but ГИ 
tell you, when I drive from Sundance to 
Santa Fe, where we have some property, 
1 love a cheeseburger. It's one of those sec- 
tions of the country that don't have a lot 
of healthy food options, so what are you 
going to do? I'm forced to have a Big Mac 
or a Whopper or a chocolate malt. I like 
those old-fashioned American pleasures. 
PLAYBOY: How are you with more mod- 
ern pleasures? Are you a web surfer or a 
video-game guy? 

REDFORD: No. I love technology. It makes 
life easier. But I see people checking 
their handheld devices, and they make 
me want to scream. Technology has 
taken the poetry out of communication. 
I love letter writing. I love getting letters. 
You can feel the person at the other end. 
These digital messages we get are over 
and out. The shorthand leaves me kind 
of cold. It's why I don't have e-mail. 
PLAYBOY: You run the Sundance Film Festi- 
val and you don't have an e-mail address? 
REDFORD: I have an addictive enough 
personality to know if I started e-mailing 
people, I would constantly be checking 
in, constantly e-mailing people about 
financing or whatever. Fortunately at 
Sundance, we have a bigger team in 
place now than we did the first year, 
when I was literally out on Main Street 
in Park City, saying, "Hey, we're showing 
a film in here. Want to come see it?" 
PLAYBOY: With 50,000 attendees 
expected next year, you don't need to 
do that anymore. In fact, many people 


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PLAYBOY 


say Sundance has become a media cir- 
cus and a corporate sellout. 

REDFORD: It certainly has grown. The 
success of Sex, Lies and Videotape in 1989 
brought the Hollywood merchants. 
Once the merchants came, the distribu- 
tion and marketing people came. The 
agents came, the Weinsteins came, the 
film press came, the celebrities came, 
and the paparazzi came. Once the 
paparazzi came, fashion came. Then 
another type of paparazzi came, and 
the parties got bigger. And the crowds 
got bigger. That's when the difficulties 
began—to manage it, to keep the reins 
on it. It had been this safe haven, and 
now Paris Hilton and Britney Spears 
were coming, people who had nothing 
to do with film. I thought, Oh shit! 
PLAYBOY: Of course, the upside has 
been huge. Sundance has produced 
some amazing, provocative films: Little 
Miss Sunshine, Boys Don't Cry, The Blair 
Witch Project, El Mariachi, Saw and on 
and on. What have those successes 
meant for you personally? 

REDFORD: They've meant the world to 
me. At a certain point in my life I said, 
I've achieved something. Life has been 
good to me. What can I put back? The 
idea of creating opportunities for others 
felt really good. There's no equivalent 
in the movie world of summer stock in 
the theater, of a training ground where 
you can learn by making mistakes and 
are free to risk. That was the whole point 
of the Sundance Lab, and the films that 
came through there needed a place to 
screen, so we created the festival. Hol- 
lywood has never been a safe place. It's 
competitive; it's cutthroat. People will 
slice you apart for money, and nobody 
cares much about artistic content. We've 
worked hard with Sundance to nurture 
talent, to make movies that aren't just 
about the bottom line. 

PLAYBOY: Looking back on Sundance, 
is there one glory moment that stands 
out for you? 

REDFORD: Quentin Tarantino came 
through our lab. Paul Thomas Ander- 
son, Wes Anderson, Kevin Smith. These 
were all glory moments, but the biggest 
moment I remember was when I was in 
New York for a photo op, which I never 
like, for Quiz Shou, and I was getting itchy 
and scratchy and wanted out. All of a 
sudden this guy came up who looked like 
a panhandler. He had an Army fatigues 
jacket on, long straight hair, and he 
started in, "Mr. Redford, Mr. Redford." 
I said, "Sorry, son, I gotta go," but he 
had something for me. People always 
have something to give me—a picture to 
sign, a script to read—but it was a tape of 
a movie, I said, "I can't," but he started 
begging me. Partly to get rid of the guy, 
I took it. But I also knew that's what Sun- 
dance was about. Anyway, it turned out 
the guy was Ed Burns, and the movie was 
The Brothers McMullen, which he'd made 


56 for less than $35,000. I called Eddie and 


told him to cut 35 minutes. He showed 
it at Sundance. It won the big award 
and went on to push Waterworld, a movie 
made for $175 million, out of theaters. 
There's nothing more gratifying than 
seeing a kid who put everything on his 
credit card or borrowed from everybody 
in his family to make something great. 
That's the glory of independent film. 
PLAYBOY: Do you worry that Sundance 
will become irrelevant in an age when 
everybody on YouTube is an indepen- 
dent filmmaker? 

REDFORD: No, because Sundance delivers 
something you can't get sitting in front of 
your computer. We've given something 
to the moviegoer: an experience. The 
big movie theaters came in and created 
very hostile environments. You have thin 
walls, 20 theaters and concession prices 
that are through the roof. People are 
noisy, and they usher you in and out as 
quickly as possible with one movie and 
six bombastic trailers. Our latest venture 
takes Sundance into towns across Amer- 
ica with our chain of Sundance Cinemas. 
It's not the kind of chain that plants a 
Godzilla footprint in a neighborhood and 


You want to be seen for what 
you can do, not for your hair 
or your blue eyes or your 
teeth. The golden-boy thing 
became a screen in front of 
everything else. 


takes the money and runs but a group 
of theaters that are at heart a gathering 
place for people who love film. These 
venues partner with local arts organi- 
zations and universities and bring the 
feeling of the labs. The advice I got was 
"Don't do it. Theaters are dying." But we 
have six so far, and they're working. 
PLAYBOY: Is it fair to say all the attention 
on Sundance and other people's work 
took its toll on your acting career? 
REDFORD: I underestimated the amount 
of time and energy Sundance would 
take. I underestimated what would hap- 
pen if my ego got involved. I started tak- 
ing it personally and felt the need to put 
money into it, raise money for it. So I 
didn't make as many films. My attentions 
were elsewhere, and I have mixed feel- 
ings about what that has meant. The cost 
of Sundance has been great personally in 
that it wore me out. I'm ready to let go 
now. Г! always be involved with it, but I 
don't have to tend it. And I miss my own 
work so much that I need to get back to 
it. I still want to do more. 

PLAYBOY: You haven't done too badly 
for the son of a milkman. If you had to 


choose one moment from childhood to 
relive, what would it be? 

REDFORD: The eighth grade. It was a 
particular time in my life when women 
kicked into gear. I excelled at sports. I 
became more social. Life was good. The 
war was over. America was at its highest 
point in the 1950s. It was a high point 
for a number of reasons, and it came 
together in the eighth grade. 

PLAYBOY: Is it true your family never con- 
sidered you a success? 

REDFORD: My father and grandfather 
both gave me a hard time. When I went 
into acting they were scared to death. 
My father came from a very poor back- 
ground in New England; he was very 
cautious and tried to put that shadow on 
me. When he gave me my allowance, he 
would hold on to the dollar bill for a few 
extra seconds so I would know where it 
came from. He wanted me to go to Stan- 
ford and get a conventional job, get into 
business, but I wasn't going that way. 
PLAYBOY: Wasn't he impressed once you 
got your early TV and stage gigs? 
REDFORD: Even when I started becoming 
well-known, he was still concerned that 
the bottom would drop out. I would 
get one bad review for Barefoot in the 
Park, and that's the one he would men- 
tion. Eventually he came around and 
was proud of me, and I think he was 
surprised he was proud. But his father 
was the real troublemaker. When Dad 
told him I wanted to be an artist, my 
grandfather said, "Did you tell him he 
can't eat art?" Later, when my grandfa- 
ther was dying, I went to see him at a 
nursing home in Connecticut. I wanted 
to please him, so I got dressed up and 
pulled up in a fancy car and told him, 
"Things are going great. I got this part 
and that part." The nurses had fallen in 
love with my grandfather. He was a real 
charmer. And they said, "Charles, isn't it 
lovely your grandson is doing so well," 
and he said, "Yeah, but you might want 
to count the silverware when he leaves." 
PLAYBOY: Besides keeping you humble, 
what did your family teach you? 
REDFORD: When I was in the third grade, 
I had a friend named Lois Levinson, 
and she was my pal. One day I began 
to notice this buzz around school: Some- 
body was a Jew. I didn't understand what 
was going on. Then I heard words like 
kike and Yid, things like that. Suddenly 
something bad was going on, and it had 
something to do with being a Jew. One 
day out of the blue, in class, Lois stood 
up and said, "My name is Lois Levinson, 
and I'm a Jew." And I thought, Lois is 
one of those! Lois? Oh my God! Why is 
she doing this? "And I'm proud of it," 
she said. Very bold, very brave but very 
confusing to me. So I ran home, and at 
the dinner table I said, "Hey, what am 
I?" My dad said, "What do you mean?" 
I said, "Today Lois Levinson got up and 
said she was a Jew. What am 12” My dad 
said, "You're a Jew." I said, "What?" I 


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thought my life was over. My mom said, 
"Charlie, Charlie!" And he said, "No, he 
should know about this." And I was dev- 


astated. My dad had a wicked sense of 


humor. I ran to my room and was in there 
awhile before he came in and said, "Look, 
I told you that to make a point." It made 
a huge impact on me. From then on I was 
going to defend anybody in that situation, 
PLAYBOY: Who gave you the idea you 
could achieve greatness? 

REDFORD: Aside from Ted Williams, 
nobody, really. If I had to name a person, 
it was my father's brother, David. He was 
an amazing guy, six feet six inches with 
black hair, an incredible athlete. He went 
to Brown University on a scholarship, 
became Phi Beta Kappa and a Rhodes 
Scholar and spoke four languages flu- 
ently. When World War II broke out he 
was offered a job playing ball with the 
St. Louis Browns, but he went into the 
Army instead and became General Pat- 
ton's translator. He was killed by a sniper 
at the Battle of the Bulge. I was around 
seven, and it was the first sense I had that 
things could go really wrong. But Uncle 
David also showed me life could be an 
adventure. Professionally, l've always 
been grateful to Paul Newman for giv- 
ing me the chance to be in Butch Cassidy. 
After that my life changed forever. 
PLAYBOY: There's been talk recently of you 
and Newman getting back together to make 
another movie. What's the status of that? 
REDFORD: It's not happening, sadly. Paul 
and I were planning on doing a film ver- 
sion of Bill Bryson’s wonderful book A 
Walk in the Woods. | got the rights to it 
four years ago, and we couldn't decide 
if we were too old to do it, Then we 
decided, Let's go for it. But time passed, 
and Paul's been getting older fast. I think 
things deteriorated for him. Finally, two 
months ago, he called and said, "I gotta 
retire.” The picture was written and 
everything. It breaks my heart. 

PLAYBOY: Does that make you think about 
your own retirement or, dare we say, 
your mortality? 

REDFORD: Retirement is not an issue for 
me. I'm going to keep working, and I 
would like to put together more than 
one picture every three years. I'm inter- 
ested in telling the story behind the story 
everyone knows about Jackie Robinson. 
We've all seen so many photographs 
of him as this emblematic figure in the 
Brooklyn Dodgers uniform, who broke 
the color barrier and paved the way for 
black players to compete in the major 
leagues. But nobody knows the story of 
how he got to that point. Very few people 
know the story of his relationship with 
Branch Rickey, the white baseball execu- 
tive who signed him. Even fewer know 
how virulent the racial prejudice Robin- 
son faced was, what a threat his signing 
was to the Negro Leagues and the tre- 
mendous amount of risk involved in his 
going to the majors. I would like that to 
be my next picture. 


PLAYBOY: And when you're not making a 
movie, what will you do? 

REDFORD: I would like to spend as much time 
as possible being physical. I've been physical 
all my life, and it gives me such pleasure to 
ski, bike and play tennis. I'm also interested 
in talking to people, to tell the public who I 
am a little more. I pretty much stay private, 
but about two years ago I realized people 
had lost touch with who I was because I 
wasn't out there on TV and had always 
said no to publicity. People had fallen for 
this image. I sensed something. Someone 
suggested I should go out and start speak- 
ing, to tell people who I am a little more. 
So I signed up with a speakers bureau 
and started talking at college campuses, 
to groups, to Vegas. You wouldn't believe 
how much they'll pay me to stand onstage 
for seven minutes with the head of Intel. 
But it was also a real education for me. 
PLAYBOY: Did you feel like a rock star? 
REDFORD: What I felt was respect. People 
have actually been moved by whatever it 
is Гуе done, and there was this enormous 
gratitude. "Thank you, Mr. Redford, for The 
Great Waldo Pepper" Or "Itook my grandfa- 
ther to see A River Runs Through It, and he 
asked me to take him to the river one last 
time." And also "Thank you for speaking 
out on the environment and for various 
issues all these years." It gives me hope that 
the work I've done means something. 
PLAYBOY: Do you believe in an afterlife? 
REDFORD: I'm not sure I do. Гуе explored 
every religion, some very deeply, enough 
to know there's not one philosophy that 
can satisfy me. Problems can't be solved 
with one way of thinking. If anything is my 
guide, nature is. That's where my spiritual- 
ity is. I don't believe in organized religion, 
because I don't believe people should be 
organized in how they think, in what they 
believe. That has never been driven home 
as hard as with this administration. When 
somebody thinks God speaks to him, you've 
got trouble. If God is speaking to the presi- 
dent, he's speaking with a forked tongue, 
because the behavior of this administration 
doesn't seem very godlike or spiritual. 

I often think of the arc of my life as 
having moved from a very narrow space 
to a much larger one. Growing up in à 
working-class world in Los Angeles, I 
had no luxuries or entertainment. I was 
ashamed to have people come to our 
house. You're defined by that, and you 
try to take every opportunity that comes 
to you with whatever skills you've got. In 
my case, I acted awhile and then tried to 
advance those skills. Theater led to TV, 
TV led to film, and acting led to direct- 
ing and producing, which led me to 
think about Sundance. Each time, I got 
itchy. I wanted more authorship, more 
ownership of the subject. It's all part of 
the adventure I've sought since I was a 
kid. Is there an afterlife? As far as I know, 
this is it. It's all we've got. You take your 
opportunities and you go for it. 


He was president of the World Bank and one of the most 
powerful men in Washington. But as he learned, when 


they're out to get you, they'll get you 


TED 
PASOTO NETO: 


PAUL 
М, (ФЕ БУ A 


by 


James Rosen 


downtown Washington office in August 2005, astonished. “I don't need you to be fucking me." 

It certainly was an odd way for Xavier Coll, the lanky Spanish physician serving as the 
World Bank’s vice president for human resources, to begin a conversation with Shaha Ali Riza, 
a 51-year-old single mother and the acting communications manager for the bank's Middle East 
and North Africa bureau. Not only was Coll expected, as the bank's top HR official, to exhibit 
more chivalrous behavior, but Riza was, as he certainly knew, well connected. The very reason 
for his visit was to help resolve the thorny conflict-of-interest problem that had arisen five 
months earlier when Riza's lover, Paul Wolfowitz, the former deputy defense secretary under 
Donald Rumsfeld, was selected by President Bush to serve as president of the World Bank. 

Neither Coll nor the angry Riza ever specified which kind of “fuck” each had in mind: 
straightforward physical intercourse or the two-faced, arm's-length backstabbing that is, 
frankly, more common in Washington. It hardly mattered: sex never strayed far from the 
agenda during the ensuing controversy, which ended this past June with Wolfowitz's spectacu- 
lar fall from power amid a swirl of ethics charges and cries of a smear campaign. 

Those who campaigned most vocally for Wolfowitz's ouster have portrayed their success as 
a simple story of crime and punishment, a case of gross and greedy favoritism exposed and 
redressed: The system, designed to protect a prestigious multinational lending institution that 
spends $20 billion a year to combat poverty worldwide, worked. 

The reality was far different. What happened to Wolfowitz was more akin to a putsch, the 
work of entrenched enemies who seized on a false pretext to engineer the overthrow of a flawed 
and mistake-prone leader closely identified with an unpopular war. Perhaps Wolfowitz himself, 
who had found orderly regime change in Iraq so elusive, could look back in moments of reflec- 
tion with some admiration for the swift, clean way it was achieved at the World Bank. 

For the timing, which was roughly coincident with the excommunication of Rumsfeld and the trial 
and conviction of Lewis "Scooter" Libby, suggested more broadly a season of retribution against the 


I did not come here to fuck you,” the man began. “I should hope not,” the woman replied, sitting in her 


PHOTOGRAPH BY 
NIGEL PARRY/CPI/VANITY FAIR MAGAZINE 


62 


As deputy defense secretary, Wolfowitz was accustomed to wielding power. Counterdockwise from top left: visiting Abu Ghraib prison in 2003; 
sharing a chuckle with Vice President Cheney; testifying before the 9/11 Commission with, from left, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld and Joint 
Chiefs Chairman Richard Myers; his companion, Shaha Riza; as president of the World Bank, discussing Third World debt relief with Bono. 


very ideological class in American political life—neoconserva- 
tives—that had most ardently promoted that concept. 

Intellect was never the problem. Born in Brooklyn in 1943 and 
raised in Manhattan, Wolfowitz came from a Polish immigrant fam- 
ily largely decimated by the Holocaust. He majored in mathemat- 
ics at Cornell and earned his Ph.D. in political science at the highly 
competitive—and conservative—University of Chicago, where his 
doctoral dissertation examined water-desalination programs in the 
Middle East. Over the next 30 years Wolfowitz attained proficiency 
in five languages, including Hebrew and Arabic, and served six 
presidents in a series of increasingly impressive posts in the diplo- 
matic and defense establishments. He rode out the Clinton years, 
a grim Siberian exile for neoconservative intellectuals, as dean of 
the Johns Hopkins University's School for Advanced International 
Studies. In congressional testimony, he advocated missile defense 
and preemptive strikes against Saddam Hussein. The New Yorker 
conceded his ability "to recognize threatening patterns and capa- 
bilities that others had been unable to see." 

If his brilliance went undisputed, Wolfowitz's personality 
sometimes left colleagues scratching their head or, worse still, 
questioning his judgment. "Paul is so virtuous," said one Wash- 
ington think-tank director, "I think he is sometimes“ a strug- 
gle for words ma.“ This perception of Wolfowitz as deeply 
principled but not always sensible persisted in the Bush admin- 
istration. In high-level councils preceding the September 11 
attacks, Wolfowitz reportedly argued that Al Qaeda posed less 
of a danger to the United States than Saddam. He urged fellow 
deputies at the State Department and the CIA to use American 
military might to establish a beachhead in Basra, in southern 
Iraq, where, under his scenario, disaffected Iraqi generals would 
surrender, defect and launch their own anti-Saddam insurgency. 
Secretary of State Colin Powell sarcastically imagined the Iraqis 
embracing Wolfowitz's plan: “ Ah, the Americans have taken 14 
acres of southern Basra. Let's go turn ourselves in!' " 

In his memoir, At the Center of the Storm: My Years at the 
CIA, George Tenet, the former CIA director, writes that "Wol- 
fowitz in particular was fixated on the question of including 
Saddam in any U.S. response" to 9/11. Tenet recalls the dep- 
uty defense secretary being more adamant than either Bush or 


Rumsfeld about Iraqi complicity in the attacks and pressing the 
CIA to "check, recheck and recheck" the issue after analysts 
concluded there was none. Likewise, as Karen DeYoung reports 
in Soldier: The Life of Colin Powell, Richard Clarke, the Clinton 
holdover and White House counterterrorism czar, grew "increas- 
ingly testy with Wolfowitz's fixation on Baghdad." 

Resentment burned inside Wolfowitz for years. At a black- 
tie dinner in March 2004 he gloomily swore to a reporter 
that the publication of Clarke's memoir, Against All Enemies, 
which claims President Bush blindly ignored the Al Qaeda 
threat, would cost Bush reelection. “1 seriously doubt most 
voters know who the hell Dick Clarke is," the reporter coun- 
tered. "| also doubt eight months from now they're going to 
walk into the ballot booth and say to themselves, 'Well, gee, 
there was Dick Clarke's book....' " 

"No," Wolfowitz frowned. "This is acid on the face of the 
president. Acid, I tell you!" 

There was also—how else to put it?—the "ick" factor. Viewers 
of Fahrenheit 9/11 are treated to outtake footage of the deputy 
prepping for a TV interview, running his comb through his mouth 
like Dylan playing "Mr. Tambourine Man" on a harmonica, then 
mashing down his hair with spit on his hand, an embarrassed 
grin plastered across his elfin face, He left a similar impression 
after a visit, as World Bank president, to a Turkish mosque. Asked 
to remove his shoes, Wolfowitz revealed worn gray socks with 
identical holes through which his two big toes protruded like 
Daisy and Mozart popping their heads up from the burrow in an 
episode of Meerkat Manor. The photographs made him an object 
of ridicule. "Would you take fiscal advice," asked The Washing- 
ton Post, "from a man who won't spend $3 for new socks?" 

He seemed to rub people the wrong way. “Obviously | ruf- 
fled some feathers," he admitted of his January 2006 deci- 
sion to suspend World Bank loans worth $124 million to the 
African country of Chad. The move was a logical response to 
the refusal of corrupt Chadian officials to abide by previous 
lending agreements, but inside the bank the decision dark- 
ened Wolfowitz's reputation and foreshadowed his later trou- 
bles. Up to that point the new president had worked hard— 
with some success—to establish (continued on page 136) 


“It was the most fantastic orgy I have ever been to. I was the only girl.” 


64 


THE 
BONDS 


Kimberly Bell with Barry Bonds during better 
days. The two met in 1994 and had a relationship 
that lasted nine years, until Bonds became, in 
her words, “a sudden sociopathic personality.” 


(JRL 


A story of sex, drugs and baseball 


by Steve Pond 


hen Kimberly Bell stepped off the plane at San Jose 
International Airport in May 2003, she was feeling more 
than a little nervous. Delayed 20 minutes by a late flight 
from Phoenix, she still had to rent a car and drive almost 
an hour to San Francisco, and her boyfriend, Barry Bonds, didn't 
like it when she was late. Plus he had been angry and moody lately, 
leaving menacing phone messages and dropping chilling threats 
into their conversations. As she rode up in the elevator of the San 
Francisco hotel where he was waiting, her heart was racing. 

"| had barely pushed the door open," she remembers, "before he 
grabbed me by the throat, choking me. He held me against the wall 
and pressed himself against me. And he's huge. He whispered in my 
ear, "You ever pull some fucking shit like that again, I'll kill you.'" 

How did it go so wrong? Bell considers that question and others like 
it frequently these days. Why did she fall for Bonds on a summer after- 
noon in 1994? What happened to tum the romance into rage? And why 
won't he tell the truth about her, about steroids, about anything? 

When Kimberly arrives at Playboy Studio West for her photo shoot, 
she's carrying a scrapbook filled with clips, transcripts and letters that 
tell a story. It's not just a story of a romance gone bad but one of drug 
abuse and betrayal, one that has brought Major League Baseball to 
its knees. She turns a few pages and stops at a 1993 magazine cover 
featuring a slim, smiling Barry Bonds. "This is how sweet and nice he 
looked when | met him, which is nothing like how he looks today," she 
says. “| mean, nothing. It's not even the same person." 

The Barry Bonds that Kimberly met in 1994 was lean, charismatic 
and irresistible. She met him after a game, saw him the next day at 
a barbecue, and that was it. They drove away in his Porsche at 100 
miles an hour. She was young and single, and he was divorcing his 
first wife. Their relationship was physical from the start. They would 
make love in the afternoon, and if he hit a home run that night, she'd 
wonder if he did it for her. That's not to say the National League's 
seven-time most valuable player was an MVP in the bedroom. "For 
the record," she says, "he's incredibly (text continued on page 141) 


PHOTOGRAPHY BY ARNY FREYTAG 


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YOUR BRAIN In Love 
The highest compliment you can offer Helen Fisher is to say she 
seems easy to fall in love with. For the past 25 years, first at the 


ILLUSTRATION 


American Museum of Natural History and now at the Center for 
Human Evolutionary Studies at Rutgers University, she has exam- 
ined the mysterious forces that draw couples together, Fisher 
has come to believe romantic love is a fundamental drive on a 
par with hunger and thirst, impossible to ignore. It even holds 
sway over our natural narcissism: A reliable sign that a person 
has fallen hard is when he says he is willing to die for his lover, 
"Romantic love is a drug as powerful as any narcotic, if not more 
so," Fisher says from her Manhattan office near the human zoo of 
Central Park. “It's thrilling when our love is returned and power- 
fully negative when it is cut off." 

In Fisher's view, the human mating pattern involves three 
distinct neural processes that developed millions of years ago 
in our earliest hominid ancestors. In her book Why We Love she 
identifies them as (a) lust, or the craving for sexual gratification 
that initiates a pairing ("What a fox!"), (b) attraction, which 
saves time and energy by helping us focus on suitable partners 
(“She's the one") and (c) attachment, a.k.a. companionate love, 
the emotional bond that keeps a couple together at least until 
their offspring can walk and feed themselves ("We are family"). 
When you fall for someone, several predictable events occur. First, 
your beloved takes her place at the center of your existence at the 


By MIRKO ILIC 


expense of friends, family and work (or, as Romeo puts it, “Juliet 
is the sun"). Second, you aggrandize her as being close to perfect 
and think about her constantly (or, as Robert Graves puts it, "Love 
is a bright stain on the vision/Blotting out reason"). Finally, you 
crave a deep emotional union, a mingling of souls (or, as Modern 


sex 
INHALER 


English puts it, “I'll stop the 
world and melt with you"). 
With the help of a technol- 
ogy called functional mag- 
netic resonance imaging, or 
fMRI, scientists have been 
able for the first time to peer 
inside love-pickled brains for 
clues about how the circuitry 
works. For a study published 
in 2005, Fisher, psychologist 
Arthur Aron and neurologist 
Lucy Brown recruited 17 men 
and women ages 18 to 26 
who had fallen in love during 
the previous 17 months. They 
placed each volunteer's head 
inside an fMRI scanner, which 
measures the brain's neural 
activity by charting blood flow, 
then displayed a photo of his 
or her beloved for 30 seconds 
and watched the fireworks. 
After analyzing 144 scans of 
each subject's brain, the team 
was surprised to see that the 
region that controls emotions 
did not light up. Instead the 
activity was deeper, in the 
caudate nucleus, part of our 
subconscious, reptilian core. 
The nucleus, which Fisher 
calls "the furnace of roman- 
tic love," helps us iden- 
tify, choose and anticipate 
rewards. This means it goes 
haywire not only in lovers 
but in gamblers and cocaine 
addicts expecting a payday. It 
showed the most activity in 
volunteers who scored highest 
on psychological tests mea- 
suring their passion (e.g., "I 
tremble in anticipation at the 
sight of my lover")—finally, 
then, we have located the 
source of all mushy poetry. 
The caudate nucleus oper- 
ates on a circuit with another 
central part of the brain, the 
right ventral tegmental area. 
The VTA is loaded with nerve 
cells that produce and dis- 
tribute dopamine, a.k.a. Love 
Potion No. 1. This neural nar- 
cotic is responsible for feelings 
of energy, exhilaration, focus 
and motivation to pursue—all 
characteristics of a person in 
the grip. Novel experiences 


appear to drive up dopamine levels; researchers have found people 
are more receptive to romance after coming off a roller coaster or 
walking over a narrow, wobbly bridge—two great places, apparently, 
to meet women. Dopamine also appears to elevate levels of tes- 


tosterone, which can boost the sex 


(continued on page 127) 


UHU aRe you STRaIGHT? 


Scientists have learned most of what they know about the global 
appeal of T&A by examining men who don't share your appe- 
tites. For much of the 20th century the medical establishment 
considered homosexuality to be the result of bad parenting, but 
most biologists now believe orientation is set in the womb. That 
one identical twin can be gay and the other straight would seem 
to rule out a completely genetic explanation. But could it be 
that genes set the stage and any number of other factors, yet 
to be identified, cause a shift in the sexual center? One compel- 
ling hypothesis, first presented in 1969 by neuroendocrinolo- 
gist Günter Dórner, is that imbalances in the male fetus—such 
as unusually Low Levels of androgens or a gene sequence that 
prevents testosterone from being fully absorbed— cause the 
brain and the genitals to head in different directions. Dórner's 
hypothesis got a boost from a 2005 study conducted by scien- 
tists at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm. Led by Dr. Ivanka 
Savic, the team isolated two chemicals, one a derivative of tes- 
tosterone produced in men's sweat and the other an estrogen- 
like compound in women's urine. Savic had discovered through 
earlier experiments that these chemicals cause distinct parts of 


IN A 2005 STUDY, SCIENTISTS SHOWED 
MEN STRAIGHT AND GAY EROTICA. AS 
A BASELINE THEY MEASURED THEIR 
RESPONSE TO "NEUTRAL" IMAGES 
SUCH AS A BASEBALL SLIDE. 


the brain to be activated. For instance, female urine activates 
the standard scent-processing region of the female brain but 
lights up the hypothalamus in men. The chemical in male sweat 
does the opposite: It lights up the usual scent receptors in men 
and the hypothalamus in women. And then came the finding 
that got everyone buzzing: Gay men's brains responded in the 
same way as straight women's. 

For decades researchers have looked for factors other 
than genetics that may influence orientation but have estab- 
lished only one: Gay men, on average, tend to have more 
older brothers. Dr. Ray Blanchard, the Toronto psychiatrist 
who first documented this, hypothesizes that the mother's 
immune system produces antibodies to an antigen pres- 
ent only on the surface of male cells. Each successive male 
fetus causes more antibodies to be created, until they pass 
through the placenta and into the fetal brain. 

What about men who claim to be aroused by both gen- 
ders? A study by Michael Bailey at Northwestern University 
suggests that bisexuality may not exist. His team attached a 
device to the penises of 30 straight, 38 gay and 33 bisexual 
men to measure blood flow as each was shown straight and 
gay porn. About 75 percent of the men who claimed to be 
bisexual had blood flow to the penis only while watching 
gay porn; the other 25 percent only while watching straight 
porn. It's possible that a man exists who gets excited watch- 
ing both types of porn, but Bailey is skeptical. “For men,” he 
says, “arousal is orientation.” 


“This Myles Standish must be quite a fellow!” 


Ш 


73 


BY JASON BUHRMESTER 


PHOTOGRAPHY BY 
PRANK W ОСКЕН И. 53 


MATT LEINART 


THE CARDINALS QB HANGS WITH WILL FERRELL, WATCHES SPORTS WITH ASHTON KUTCHER, 
TALKS TRASH WITH ANQUAN BOLDIN, SHOOTS HOOPS WITH NICK LACHEY, HAS A CRUSH 
ON JENNIFER ANISTON AND STILL HAS TIME FOR FOOTBALL 


Q1 

PLAYBOY: You were cross-eyed and over- 
weight as a kid. How did you end up an NFL 
quarterback with the Arizona Cardinals? 
LEINART: | was the fat, cross-eyed kid 
with high socks-that whole story. | was 
born with strabismus, which is when the 
eye muscles don't work together. | had 
surgery when | was about a year and a half 
old and a second operation before my 
freshman year in high school to strengthen 
a muscle. But | could play sports, man. 
That's kind of what kept me cool, | guess. 
It got me in with the cool crowd. 


02 

PLAYBOY: Now the tabloids link you to 
famous women like Paris Hilton and Britney 
Spears. What's true? 

LEINART: I've hung out with а few people 
here and there, but to be honest with you 
| haven't really dated anyone considered a 
celebrity. Those things get taken way out 
of context. It just bewilders me that you 
can go to a club when a celebrity is there 
and sit at the same table with them, 
drinking or partying and having a good 
time, and the next thing you know you're 


linked to that person. And then people 
think, Oh, they're dating now. Why? 
Because they were at the same place at 
the same time? That's just a bunch of 
bullshit to me. And that happens all the 
time. | just g0 out and have a good time, 
meet somebody and enjoy their company, 
and the next thing you know it's a story. 


03 

PLAYBOY: 15 it hard to enjoy being young and 
successful with the paparazzi watching? 
LEINART: it's a lot easier to relax out here 
in Arizona than it is in L.A. Anything you 
do in L.A. is magnified if you're a celebrity 
or a high-profile person. They're looking for 
you to slip up. Sometimes you can't help it, 
and sometimes you can. That's something 
I learned. You learn from your mistakes and 
move on. It's just a pain in the ass. | look at 
some of my buddies, close friends of mine 
who are celebrities, and they can't go any- 
where without being seen. It's bullshit to 
me. Let people have their private lives. 


Q4 
PLAYBOY: What were your early days like 
at the University of Southern California? 


LEINART: I was a fairly high recruit going 
into USC, but I didn't think | was that 
good. | just had the size. Carson Palmer 
was already there. | sat behind him, 
and it was terrible. | was an awful quar- 
terback. | had no confidence and could 
barely throw the ball 10 yards. As a quar- 
terback you need to have confidence. I 
went through a lot of trial and error 
those first few years, trying to find out 
who | was as a person and a player. 


Q5 
PLAYBOY: You led USC to an undefeated 
season and won the Heisman Trophy your 
junior year. Everyone thought you would 
enter the NFL draft, but you decided to 
return to college for your senior year. That 
decision potentially cost you millions of 
dollars. Why go back? 
LEINART: There were a lot of reasons. 
First, there was school. | was very close to 
finishing. It meant a lot to my mom and 
dad. Even though I'd come off a great 
game and won the Heisman, 1 still didn't 
feel | could physically and mentally be 
successful at the NFL level. | knew if 
| came out (continued on page 146) 


75 


Fallout 3's 
vision of post- 
A-bomb life in 

— D.C. 


"Hh. Va "am — чш” 
KG PLAYBOY'S VIDEO-GAME BLOWOUT 
N “A. CEN dh “EA 


GENIUSES AT PLA 


GAME DESIGNERS EXPLAIN THE LAWS OF ADRENALINE AND THE SCIENCE OF FUN 


BY SCOTT ALEXANDER 


76 


t this point in the 21st century it's clear that video 
games constitute a medium unto themselves. It's 
an art form and an industry awash in possibility, 
with rules and boundaries that have only begun to 
be explored. When you play a game, whether it's Madden, 
Tetris or Halo, you create your own unique path through it. 


changed in almost a century. We constantly have to rein- 
vent the camera, as it were, before we can even begin to 
think about what to do with it. 

We need to start looking at using our technology not just 
to create prettier pictures for old gameplay styles but to pro- 
vide deeper stories, richer characters 


We may take video games’ multiple narratives for granted, and more complex interactions within WHAT PASSES 

but they are precisely what separates games from other story- our game worlds. That is the real fron- | FOR MATURE IN 

telling media. The player is as much the author of the tier. What passes for mature or adult | THE GAME BUSI- 

experience as the game's creator. in the game business has nothing to NESS HAS NOTH- 
To discern what makes the medium of video games dif- do with maturity or being an adult. 

ferent from other forms that preceded it, we spoke with In the late 1950s university film | ING TO DO WITH 

some of the foremost minds in the industry. They told us programs became more widespread, | MATURITY OR 


where games have been, where they're headed and what it 
all means. Some are cynical, some are stressed, others 
starry-eyed. All are passionate about what they do. 


THE BIG PICTURE 
Industry legend WARREN SPECTOR on the birth 
of a new medium and its breakneck evolution 
We are maturing rapidly, but we're still an infant medium 
trying to figure out how we do what we do. Leaving out the 
early pioneering stuff, we're about 25 years old. We're like 
moviemakers in 1920: They had figured out a lot techni- 
cally but hadn't mastered the craft. What's different is 
that we have amazing advances in hardware every three to 
five years. In film, the position of the sprocket holes hasn't 


and all of a sudden we had guys like 
Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scor- BEING AN ADULT. 
sese, Steven Spielberg and George Lucas who had studied 
history, aesthetics and theory. They came from an environ- 
ment that didn't need to make money and supported raw 
creativity. They hit the Hollywood system with a different 
sensibility. Now hundreds of universities offer game courses 
or degrees in game development and game studies. Our 
Spielberg is out there; so is our Quentin Tarantino. We're 
ready for that kind of change. We're ready for people who 
take this medium seriously, who believe in its potential. 
And frankly, its potential hasn't even been scratched. 

Play is a creative process, and every game is a dialogue 
between the game maker and the player. The player's 


involvement in shaping the experience 
makes him a creator. No other medium 
has been able to do that. And we're 
making some headway now. We're a 
cultural force: Our audience is aging 
with us, universities are catching on, 
and the mainstream media are catching 
up. Where we are now is remarkable, 
and where we'll be in five years—holy 
cow, | can't wait to see it. 


FUTURE PERFECT 
Strategy-game pioneer SID MEIER on 
how play gets under your skin 
With other media, you have to say, 
"How does this apply to me?" You 
have to identify with some aspect of a 
character or some part of a story. But 
in a computer game the whole story 
is about you. There's more of a feeling 
of ownership than in other forms of 
entertainment. If you're a lousy story- 
teller, maybe you would rather have 
Spielberg tell you a story. But | think 
people like to do things their own way. 
Games allow that. 

Reading a good 
book is different 
from playing a 
good computer 
game. But I think 
they're equally 
satisfying experi- 
ences, Gaming is 
a new art form, 
not necessarily a 
better one. But | 
am convinced 
that, in how viv- 
idly you remem- 
ber the experience and how long it 
stays with you, games are on a par 
with the other arts. 

When you make a movie, you write 
a script, compose a storyboard and 
shoot, but you don't really experience 
the film until about a month before 
it's finished. We spend as much time 
playing a game as we do designing it. 
Early on, usually within a week or two 
of starting, we have built something 
we can actually play. Then we have a 
variety of people play the game, and 
we build on that experience. We add 
new things and take out things that 
aren't working. It's an interactive, evo- 
lutionary process, a different one from 
most in terms of creativity. We are big 
believers in incremental design. 

Game makers may talk about the good 
old days, but | think these are the good 
old days. There are so many good games 
out there, and we've got powerful con- 
soles and PCs. There is very little we 
can complain about at this point. The 
only thing | miss is being able to make a 
game in six to nine months, as opposed 
to two years. But games are light-years 
better than when | started. We're living 
in a golden age of gaming. 


bet | heve many others 


Сенед from Grey Wi! of ter Baas lar 


Yow have Captured ту tears H 
Than viage n wild i^ ronemaribao, 


PLAYING FOR MONEY 
God of War 2 director CORY BARLOG 
on the brutal economics of fun 
Making games is not just physically 
and mentally challenging; it's fiscally 
challenging, because you're gam- 
bling. As confident as anybody feels 
about their game, it can go either 
way. Plenty of brilliant games are a 
joy to play and adored by the critics, 
and everyone thinks they'll be huge, 

but their sales 


God of War's Kratos 


tears up the joint. 


CG ACTING are pitiful. 

IS BEING PUSHED Games don't cost anywhere near as much as movies to 

TO THE POINT make, but movies have more ways to recoup expenses. 
Even Waterworld broke even. We could make 16 big- 

WHERE THINGS budget games for the price of Waterworld, but we don't 

NOT SAID ARE А5 have DVDs or TV to fall back on. And the higher the 

IMPORTANT AS budgets get, the fewer risks people take, which is a 


terrible direction for the industry to take. Games like 

THINGS THAT ARE. Unreal and Quake sell well because it's hard to get 
people to try something different. As much as people tell you they want to 
watch PBS or David Lynch, they actually watch the USA Network. 

Then again, being the same isn't safe either. Many games don't do very well, 
because the makers backed into the idea: "We know urban is good, and we know 
open-world games are good. Let's have 
an urban open-world game." Those 
games don't come out well, because they 
don't start from a strong core idea. 


BUILDING CHARACTER 
Mass Effect maestro RAY MUZYKA on 
new frontiers in virtual acting 
Each new generation of technology 
has an exponentially greater impact 
on storytelling. This generation has 
empowered us to convey emotion. We 
can finally include all the nuances that 
are important to showing emotion. Vir- 
tual, computer-generated acting is being 
pushed to the point where what is not said can be more powerful than what is 

said—such as a small gesture, a tilt of the head, a raised eyebrow. 

All the exploration, combat, progression and characters are designed to make 
the players feel something, to make them truly care about the environment and the 
characters. We can do things in real time that we used to do with pre-rendered cut 
scenes. And that takes nonlinear storytelling to another level. Instead of watch- 
ing a movie, you're playing through a cinematic moment. You're interacting, and 
you're part of something emotional. It's like reading a great book or watching a 
great movie: A chill goes up your spine, and you feel something important. 


- 


Mass Effect teat ihel l 


limits of virtual 


PLAYBOY'S VIDEO-GAME BLOWOUT 


THE TAO OF VIOLENCE For something to resonate, it has to 


BioShock creator KEN LEVINE deliver on two levels. The Lord of the 
on the Fight Club school Rings works well because it's both a 
of bare-knuckle philosophy parable about power and a story about 


orcs and goblins. The Matrix is a philosophy class wrapped up in a cool action 
movie. Of course you always want to hide your philosophy a bit. You don't say, 
“How'd you like to play a game about an underwater objectivist utopia?" If we 
did that, we would never have gotten BioShock out of focus testing. 

Fight Club and 12 Monkeys ask the audience to look at them in a nonlinear 
way. You're used to linear narrative and believing that the screen always tells 
you the truth. Both those films are great examples for video-game developers 
because they change the interface for movies. And remember, at the end of 
the day, Fight Club is still a movie about a bunch of dudes beating the shit 
out of each other in an intense way. And that is what good 


games have to be: interesting fight clubs. If you are turned BIOSHOCK IS 

on to something intellectually while playing a game, that's | ABOUT THE 

fantastic, but it still has to be fun as a game. MESSINESS OF 
BioShock is about the messiness of ideology. What tears IDEOLOGY- AND 

the city in the game apart is what tears every city apart, 

not alien invaders but greed, money, sex and ambition— | BLOWING PEOPLE 

the stuff that makes us human. We're trying to examine | UP IN AMAZING 

all those things from a philosophical standpoint. And then NEW WAYS 


we have the big fucking guns. It's about blowing people 

up in amazing new ways and empowering the player to use every aspect of his 
environment as a weapon. We get to have our cake and eat it, too. My parents 
are happy because I'm using my college education; gamers are happy 
because they get to blow stuff up in ways they never thought about before. 


CAVA IE RS 


(DS) Some things are just perfect. This 
is one of them. Little Big Planet (PS3) 
A powerful world-creation 
tool disguised as an ador- 
able platformer. Mass 
Effect (360) BioWare's 
new breed of RPG mashes 
up shooting, strategy and 
conversation into a heady intergalactic 
cocktail. Mercenaries 2: World in 
Flames (360, PC, PS2, PS3) Destabi- 
lize Venezuela for fun and 
profit. Ratchet and Clank 
Future: Tools of Destruc- 
tion (PS3) The cathartic, 
cartoony franchise gets 
biggered and boldered. 
Rock Band (360, PS2, PS3) Take the 
Guitar Hero formula and add drums, 
bass and vocals. Downloads will fea- 
DI ture entire original albums 
from the Who, Nirvana 
and more. Super Mario 
Galaxy (Wii) The little 
plumber that could goes to 
outer space. TimeShift 
(360, PC, PS3) Stop, slow and rewind 
time in this fast-paced, mind-bending 
shooter. Uncharted: Drake's Fortune 

7 (Р53) High-definition high 
adventure awaits as you 
search for treasure on a 
tropical island. Unreal 
Tournament Ill (bottom, 
360, PC, PS3) Fast, fun 
and violent, this version adds vehicles 
to the mix of mayhem. 


Every year, the games industry tops 
itself, and this one is no exception. In 
the past two months we've 
been treated to such instant 
classics as BioShock (360, 
PC), Halo 3 (360), Stran- 
glehold (360, PC, PS3), $ 
Guitar Hero Ill: Legends of | 

Rock (360, PS2, PS3, Wil), Metroid 
Prime 3: Corruption (Wii) and Heav- 
enly Sword (PS3). Here's what we'll be 
calling in sick for during EZ 


the next few months. 
Assassin's Creed (pictured 
top, 360, PC, PS3) Travel 
the Middle East as a Cru- 
sades-era hit man. A stun- 
ningly hi-res Jerusalem awaits. 
Burnout Paradise (second from top, 
360, PS3) The ne plus ultra of arcade 
racers goes open-world | - т 
and online-centric as you 
cruise a city stocked with 
live drivers spoiling for a 
fight. Call of Duty 4: Mod- 
ern Warfare (360, PC, 
PS3) The phenomenal military shooter 
leaves World War 11 behind for a visu- 
ally jaw-dropping present day. Crysis 
(third from top, PC) This , 

sci-fi romp may be the 
most graphically advanced № 
game ever made. God of 
War: Chains of Olympus 
(PSP) A very portable 
version of the very angry demigod. The 
Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass 


WHERE AND HOW TO BUY ON PAGE 127. 


HOOKED ON A FEELING 
Fable 2 creator PETER MOLYNEUX 
on making players feel loved 
| have done some of the most ridicu- 
lous, farcical stories in computer-game 
history. | have done stories about gods, 
stories about cities controlled by the 
chips in people's heads and stories 
about the most horrendous bad guys. 
But | recently realized the way I've been 
telling stories is all wrong. Rather than 
starting with the story, | should be ask- 
ing, How do I want you, the player, to 
feel? If | can get you to feel different 
from ways you've felt before, that's 

going to make a great story. 

In Fable 2 | want players to experi- 
ence what it's like to feel loved. I've 
felt horror while playing games. I've 
felt terror, revulsion and fear. But I've 
never felt love. And if you feel loved by 
a character, you're more inclined to 
like that character, to get involved with 
him and care about what happens to 
him. If you care about something or 
someone in the story, then I've got 
you, because then you're going to care 
about how the story turns out. 


THE GRAND ILLUSION 
God of War creator DAVID JAFFE 
on why cheap tricks offer the most fun 

The innovation in God of War was that 
we never set out to be innovative. We set 
out to entertain the crap out of the 
player, and we didn't care if we used 
sleight of hand or less robust game sys- 
tems. Our game-design colleagues might 
have pooh-poohed our systems because 


they weren't very deep. And they were 
right. That's because we set out from the 
beginning to try to be the video-game 
equivalent of Jerry Bruckheimer. We 
wanted to produce something totally 
mainstream that was entertaining from 
the get-go. We were absolute slaves to 
making the audience happy, and nothing 


else mattered. | don't cringe at that. | 
think it's noble. I'm proud to have 
worked on a series that lots of people 
actually play all the way to the end. 
The top-tier designers who are good 
at game systems don't need a lot of 
bells and whistles to keep you engaged. 


Strategy games like Civilization IV, or 
even simple games like Uno or Poker, 
are so well designed they don't need a 
lot of the kinetic energy we put into 
games like God of War. But I'm not 
that kind of designer, so | have to rely 
on sleight of hand and misdirection. 
During a focus test, if | sense a 
player is getting bored, my first 
impulse is to throw something 
else at him to keep him occu- 
pied. Of course, we spend a lot 
of time tuning and polishing, so 
we still end up making compel- 
ling games. In an ideal world, | 
would like the game's central 
system to be what keeps the 
player engaged, rather than just 
throw a bunch of simple systems 
at the player one after the other. 
That's the direction | was trying to 
take when we made Calling All Cars! 

l've attended too many meetings in 
which somebody—including myself— 
has seen a deep, emotional movie 
over the weekend and he comes in on 
Monday morning full of piss and vin- 
egar, ready to take the medium to the 
next level. I've read articles with all 
this hyperbole about how games will 
be the next great entertainment 
medium and how this is more power- 
ful because bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. 
At the end of the day, you're walking 
around a place that looks like World 
War II, trying to find a fucking key to 
open a door. | actually think all these 
grand prophecies will come to pass. | 
think the interactivity in what we call 
video games today will ultimately be 
called something different and will 


affect the mainstream much more 
powerfully than film does. But right 
now it feels like a bunch of people 
wanting to convince themselves 
they're doing important work. | believe 
the most important stuff we're doing 
today is about having fun. 


Technology runs 


FUTURE SHOCK 
Too Human creator DENIS DYACK says 
better technology is an empty goal 
We're reaching a perceptual threshold 
at which the average consumer will 
have a harder time telling when leaps 


"David Jaffe's Calling All Gers! 


ence between 480p resolution and 
720p or 1080p, but it’s not a massive 
one. In the next generation the differ- 
ence will be even smaller, and the num- 
ber of pixels won't matter that much. 
Frame rate will improve, but once you 
go beyond 60 frames a second, that 
doesn't get you much. 

It’s going to come down to content, 
storytelling and how you choose to enter- 
tain. In the early days of film the people 
who could do all the fancy cutting and 
wire tricks dominated the industry. But 
once the camera became standardized 
and technology became less important, 
those who told the best stories domi- 
nated. They were the ones who devel- 
oped the true language of film. We're 
going to be in a better place once the 
endless march of technology ceases to 
matter, At that point it becomes all 
about art and entertainment. 


ш GENIUSES AT PLAY nun 


TIL ME A STORY 


THE INTERACTIVE 
ACTION HALL CF FAME 


Notable moments from the first 20 years 
of digital storytelling: 1975-1976 Will 
Crowther and Don Woods complete the 
text-based Adventure, widely regarded as 
the first piece of interactive fiction. 1977 
Infocom releases Zork, a massive, com- 
plex text adventure. 1980 Richard Garri- 
ott releases Ultima 1 
(pictured left), one of 
the first graphical 
role-play games for 
computers. 1981 
Text game Softporn 
Adventure lets users 
navigate seedy big-city nightlife in search 
of nookie. 1983 The Dragon's Lair arcade 
game features cel animation on laser- 
discs. The reaction time of laserdisc con- 
soles makes the game nearly unplayable. 
1984 Douglas Adams 
collaborates on Info- 
com's Hitchhiker's 
Guide to the Galaxy 
text adventure. 1985 
One of the most in- 
fluential games of all 
time, Garriott's Ulti- 
ma IV centers on 
developing a moral 
and ethical charac- 
ter rather than thwarting ultimate evil. 
1986 Nintendo releases the first Legend 
of Zelda. The company likes the plot so 
much it uses the same one for the next 
21 years. 1987 Leisuresuit Larry, a 
graphical ver- 
sion of Softporn 
Adventure, is 
released, Lucas- 
Arts' Maniac 
Mansion is the 
first in a string 
of legendary 
adventure games that includes Secret 
of Monkey Island, Day of the Tentacle, 
The Dig and Loom. 1992 The Journey- 
man Project, billed as the first photo- 
realistic game, is released on the 
fledgling CD-ROM format. 1993 Myst 
(above), a CD-ROM puzzle game set in 
a gorgeous, eerie world, becomes a 
best-seller. 1994 Wing Commander 3: 


Heart of the 


Tiger features 
SOFTPORN ADVENTURE 


> 
3 
A 
а) 
$ 
гә 
=) 
> 
= 


9 


— 


Mark Hamill in 
its live-action 
scenes. This 
is a bad idea. 
Bungie releases 
Marathon, one 
of the first 
shooters with 
plot depth. The 
company goes 
on to create 
the Halo series. System Shock is released, 
featuring an intense cyberpunk plot 
and groundbreaking mechanics, An- 
other immensely influential game, it is 


\ а commercial flop. , 


PLAYING DEAD 

Halo 3 head developer Frank O’Connor 
on what makes game stories different 
There are two big differences between 
video games and other media. First, in 
games you are almost always the pro- 
tagonist. You have the power to funda- 
mentally change the outcome of events. 
The second difference—and for some 
weird reason everyone just accepts 
this—is that you can die, Harrison Ford 
and Tom Cruise don't die, but as the 
hero in the game, you die all the time. 


ES fy & 


I don't think we'll ever see heavy 
drama from a video-game story, because 
nobody cares. They want to be enabled, 
and they want to have fun. They want to 
do stuff they can't do in the real world. 
The one thing you want out of your 
experience as a protagonist is power. 
If you're playing a Mario game, it's the 
power to jump high or kick turtles. If 
it’s Halo, it's the power to be a seven- 
foot-tall killing machine. People gen- 
erally don't want to be themselves in 


PLAYBOY'S VIDEO-GAME BLOWOUT 


a video game. Even in something like 
Second Life, people never really play 
themselves. They may look like them- 
selves, but they have a nice mansion. 
You want to alter and improve your lot 
when you're in a video game. Heavy 
drama works great when it's filmed, 
because you're an observer; you don't 
have to take on those problems. 

From a writing perspective, if you 
watch a two-hour film, there's a linear 
narrative. There is a start, a middle, 
an end and a credit roll. It's easy to 


remember everything that just hap- 
pened and put it in context. Writing 
for video games is different because 
you may play for an hour, see 15 min- 
utes of cinematic-style storytelling, not 
play for a week, then come back and 
pick up where you left off. We have to 
accommodate that without using TV- 
show devices like recaps. You have to 
infuse the story into the world. That 
way the player understands his goals 
even if he skips the cut scenes. Halo 3 


has 40,000 lines of combat dialogue 
alone. That's just for how people react 
when they're shot, when you stare at 
them or when you shove them off a hill. 
They have multiple natural reactions 
to what's going on. So when you're the 
player in the heat of battle and people 
are screaming things, you create the 
story by playing through it. Basically our 
job is to write the overriding narrative, 
and then the players create the mini- 
narratives themselves—both through 
playing and by unconsciously backfill- 
ing the story using their imagination. 


ROLE WITH IT 

Serial innovator Richard Garriott 

on fantasy and self-actualization 
I think role-play games have a special 
role to play in society. If we look at how 
kids learn, it's often through role- 
playing. Whether it's a role-play tea party 
or army men, you're exploring those 
boundaries of social interaction with 
other real people—and you're finding 
that when you knock Johnny down, he 
cries and goes home. In the same way, 
| think role-playing in a computer game 
definitely has the capacity to make a 
positive effect. As a game developer, 


you can weave par- 
ables into the story HARRISON FORD 


to provoke real | DOESN'T DIE, 
thought in your | TOM CRUISE 
players; you can , 

give them mental DOESN'T DIE, 
challenges, as well | BUT AS THE 
as ramifications for | HERO YOU DIE 
their choices that ALL THE TIME. 


they actually have 

to live with. If those are reasonably 
good reflections of reality, video games 
can play an extremely positive role. 
When we make games, we try to hold a 
mirror up to people and say, "This is a 
way to examine yourself.” The more 
thought-provoking you make the sub- 
ject, the better. We're just looking for 
the most interesting mirrors. 


*#eecee eee eeeeeeeeeceeceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeceeeeeeeeeeeoeeeeeeaeeeeeeeee 


here's plenty more where this came 
from. Head to playboy.com/games 
for extended versions of the above 
interviews, as well as our exclusive sit- 
downs with the following game- 
industry luminaries and many others. 


“Our medium will eventually encom- 
pass all the others. Fifty or 60 years 
from now people will play their soap 
operas instead of watching them.” 

— Harvey Smith, Blacksite: Area 51 


“You couldn’t invent a more hostile 
medium for stories than gaming." 
—Cliff Bleszinski, Gears of War 


“When games started costing a million 
dollars, people thought the economics 
were broken. Today we regularly spend 
$20 million to $30 million on a game." 
—Phil Harrison, 

Sony Worldwice Studio President 


“The player is a guy who gets pulled up 

on a stage where he's the only person 

who didn't get a copy of the script." 
im Schafer, Psychonauts 


“This medium allows the player to be a 

co-creator in a way that seems very 

close to the literary experience.” 
—Clive Barker, Jericho 


“The most influential game in my life 
was probably PaRappa the Rapper.” 
—Alex Rigopoulos, Guitar Hero 


“| think we're all getting a little sick of 
the 25-year-old invulnerable super- 
soldier going to save the planet again.” 

—Jens Peter Kurup, Kane & Lynch 


“Violent movies get talked about indi- 
vidually, not as a medium. When one 
comes out, nobody asks, ‘Are movies 
corrupting America?’ The way today’s 
media respond to video-game violence 
is ridiculous.” 

—Todd Howard, Fallout 3 


SEE AN EXPANDED EDITION OF THIS FEATURE AT PLAYBOY.COM/GAMES. 


“I don't know about you, but it’s past my bedtime...!” e1 


82 


NEBRASKA 


KNOCKOUT 


Marvelous Miss November has us on the ropes 


he state of Nebraska stands out for its beautiful 
spacious skies and amber waves of...Lindsay 
Wagner. No, we're not talking about the actress 
who played the bionic woman in the 1970s, 
although the 19-year-old Omaha native you 
see here has heard that rap her whole life and is cool 
with the coincidence. This Lindsay can't bend steel, but 
she's got a straight right that will have you seeing stars. 
"We have an Omaha Fight Club," she says, “and I'm a 
ring girl when my brothers compete. | don't fight, but | 
train in self-defense and practice with a lot of guys." 

We caught up with Miss November at the gym, and from 
the moment her clothes started to hit the canvas, we found 
ourselves gasping for oxygen. She has a perfect athletic 
body, and outside the ring she is a gentle, sweet young 
woman with an infectious laugh and an all-American smile. 
She says she has dreamed of being a Playmate since she 
was in sixth grade. How did she get here? It all started one 


day when a makeup artist who worked for an Omaha pho- 
tographer took notice while Lindsay was working in a tan- 
ning salon (she's also studying to be a dental hygienist). 
Soon she was modeling swimsuits and lingerie. A Playmate 
pal, Miss October 2006 Jordan Monroe, sent Lindsay's pic- 
tures to the magazine. The next thing Lindsay knew, she 
was on a flight to Los Angeles for a test shoot. She'd never 
been on an airplane before. Once in front of the camera, 
she blossomed. “I thought I'd never make PLayBoy in a mil- 
lion years," Lindsay says. “I'm confident in the way | look, 
but you know how girls sometimes have the feeling they're 
not good enough to accomplish something? When the 
shoot began, though, | was really comfortable.” 

As you can see, Lindsay is so hot she sets off smoke detec- 
tors. She's so hot she fogs up a room. She's so hot Al Gore 
could make a movie about her. Miss November has been 
having a lot of fun lately, hanging out with Playmates and 
attending Mansion parties. Nebraska's loss is L.A.'s gain. 


PHOTOGRAPHY BY STEPHEN WAYDA 


See more of Miss November at cyber.playboy.com. 


PLAYBOY'S PLAYMATE OF THE MONTH 


438W3AON SSI 


PLAYMATE DATA SHEET 


NAME: ee NN 


BUST: SA РР. WAIST: 2 Е HIPS: „ЗА _ 
Sele _ п 
HEIGHT: _5 D/L wor: Tiy => IA 


BIRTH DATE: єз BIRTHPLACE: e 


AMBITIONS: AO 


SPORTS I HAVE PLAYED: (AN N 


` 


\ 


- LI 
— 


* 
FIVE FOODS I CRAVE: Onocalade,, ice cream, oN Gnd 


SOMEONE I TRULY ADMIRE AND wi: Mo, Mona becouse She is 


Con y NS Senos Pause, 


WATCH MISS NOVEMBER'S VIDEO DATA SHEET AT PLAYBOY COM PLAYMATES 


PLAYBOY’S PARTY JOKES 


А man and his wife were watching a box- 
ing match on television. The husband 
sighed and said, "Man, what a rip-off! It 
was all over in four minutes." 

The wife replied, "Now you know how 
I feel." 


After examining a woman, a doctor took 
her husband aside and said, "I really don't 
like the way your wife looks." 

“Me neither,” the husband said, “but she's a 
good cook and gives great head,” 


Where do you put a picture of a missing 
transvestite? 
On a carton of half-and-half. 


Our Unabashed Dictionary defines virgin as a 
woman who doesn't give a fuck. 


Once upon a time a guy said to a girl, "Will 
you marry me?” 

She said no, and he lived happily ever 
after. 


A girl was telling her friend that she 
wasn't sure why she was so popular around 
school. 

"Do you suppose it's my figure?" she asked. 

"No," he replied. 

"My personality?" she asked. 

"No way," he replied. 

“I give up," she said. 

“1 think that may be it," he said, 


What's the difference between an in-law and 
an outlaw? 
Outlaws are wanted. 


Worried about her marriage, a woman visited 
a psychic. 

"There's no easy way to say this, so ГИ just 
be blunt," the seer said. "Prepare yourself to 
be a widow, Your husband will die a violent 
and horrible death this year." 

Shaken, the wife gasped, “Will I be acquitted?” 


If the dove is the bird of peace, what is the 
bird of love? 
The swallow, 


A urologist asked a patient, “How would you 
describe your love life?” 
The patient responded, "Infrequently." 
The urologist asked, “Is that one word 
or two?” 


Dia you hear about the new supersensitive 
condoms? 

After you have sex they stick around and talk 
to your date. 


Why did the blonde buy a convertible? 
For more legroom. 


A new student od the counter in the 
school dining hall. "Would you like dinner?" a 
lady with a spatula asked. 

"That depends," he said. "What are my 
choices?’ 

“Yes or no,” she answered, 


A minister stopped a woman who was about 
to enter church wearing a low-cut dress. 
"I'm afraid I can't let you go in dressed like 
that," he said. 
"But I have a divine right," she replied. 
"Yes," he said, "and your left one is beautiful 
too, but it is inappropriate for church." 


One Saturday a father stork was late for din- 
ner. When he finally came in the front door 
his wife asked, “Were you late because you 
were delivering extra babies today?" 

"No," he replied. “I was just out scaring 
college kids." 


Why don't you play golf with your boss any- 
more?" a woman asked her husband. 

"Would you like to golf with a guy who moved 
the ball behind your back?" the husband asked. 

"Well, no," admitted the wife. 

"Neither does my boss," he replied. 


Send your jokes to Party Jokes Editor, PLAYBOY, 
730 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10019, or 
by e-mail through our website at jokes.playboy.com. 
PLAYBOY will pay $100 to the contributors whose 
submissions are selected. 


95 


“It’s got youth, sex, violence, street language and a soundtrack that won't quit, and 
now you tell me you want a plot?” 


wo years aeo, while researching a 
piece for pLavaoy, veteran political 
analyst and author Jeff Greenfield 
sat down with ex-senator Fred Thompson 
at Thompson's home in suburban Wash- 
ington to talk about, well, talk-specifi- 
cally, why so much political rhetoric rarely 
reflects simple clarity and candor. Green- 
field, now senior political correspondent 
for CBS News, spent a decade working 
in politics-as a speechwriter for Robert 
Kennedy and John Lindsay and as a politi- 
cal consultant-before turning full-time 
to journalism. His most recent book, Oh, 
Waiter! One Order of Crow!, is an account of 
the contested 2000 presidential election. 
The on-the-record conversation took 
place in September 2005, well before 


GREENFIELD: Do you agree that people 
are dying to hear a human voice? It's 
almost as if they're starving for it. 
THOMPSON: Yeah. 


GREENFIELD: | think what got John McCain 
as far as he got in 2000 was a certain fear- 
lessness about saying what was on his 
mind. It's why people listened to Ross 
Perot. Ironically, politicians want to be 
liked but don't understand that their blo- 
viating distances them from the public. 

THOMPSON: Right. It doesn't work. But to 
get away from it you have to be willing to 
take a risk. If you do, you're stepping into 


Thompson contemplated throwing A y 


his hat into the presidential ring, 
Now that Thompson has joined 
the fray-with poll numbers 
showing him as likely a GOP 
nominee as any of the other 
contenders-his comments 
on why politicians should 
be more honest are even 
more timely, as well as 
something of a self- 
imposed litmus test for 
the candidate himself. 


GREENFIELD: You are 
noted for your Southern 
charm and clear speech 
at a time when politicians 
tend to say a lot of noth- 
ing. Do you agree that political 
discourse these days is mostly 
bloviating and doublespeak and of 
little substance? 


THOMPSON: You'd have to be pretty blind 
not to see it, especially if you watch the 
Senate floor for any 
period of time. It goes 
back to ancient Greece 
and Rome. It's part of the 
deal. In Lawrenceburg, 
Tennessee, where | grew 
up, on Saturday people used to come to 
town to hear the lawyers make their grand, 
flowery arguments, It was entertainment. 
There's a great tradition of it. 
GREENFIELD: Which politicians today are 
the worst offenders? 

THOMPSON: In his days as a political 
officeholder Al Gore was classic. He acted 
and behaved the way you envision a person 
in his position ought to act and behave. In 
other words, you put on your senator's cap 
or vice president's cap or presidential can- 
didate's cap. You should sound a certain 
way-serious and knowledgeable. 


X N 
NEK PRESSED 
№: 


\ 
d 
* y 


FRED THOMPSON AND JEFF GREENFIELD 
EXAMINE HOW POLITICIANS TALK-AND WHY 
THEY SO SELDOM SPEAK THE TRUTH 


the unknown: "What if they don't like me? 
What if I'm not interesting enough? What 
if they don't think I'm smart enough? If I'm 
myself, what if it's not enough?" 
GREENFIELD: Given most Americans' 
opinion of politicians, isn't being honest 
worth the risk? 

THOMPSON: Yes, but politicians can't 
afford to take too many risks. I've seen it 
time and again. If they let their hair down, 
if they came across the same way you find 
them in private conversation, they would be 
alot more likable and a lot more successful, 
but it's perceived to be a risk. When 99 can- 


ILLUSTRATION BY ROBERTO PARADA 


didates are going the other way, it's a risk 
to be the one who speaks his mind. If politi- 
cians were willing to take that risk, though, 
they'd find it would be helpful to them. The 
times | did it turned out to be the smartest 
political moves | could have made. 


GREENFIELD: When have you done it? 


THOMPSON: One time | remember a vote 
about the legislation to federalize the 
Good Samaritan law, That law said if you 
stopped to help someone on the highway, 
they couldn't sue you. | thought this was 
something the states had been taking 
care of pretty well for 200 years. They 
have reasons to give partial coverage, no 
coverage or total coverage, depending on 
such factors as whether someone was 
helpful but also unbelievably careless. So 


my view was that the states should 


handle it. The vote was 99 to one. | 
went back to the office, and the 
staff was battening down the 
hatches for an onslaught. 
It never came. | got some 
positive feedback but 
nothing negative. So back 
to the point: If you're a 
little risky and do what 
you think you ought to 
do and say what you 
think you ought to say- 
as long as you don't get 
too carried away or say 
totally stupid things-it's 
a good political strategy, 
if one wanted to make a 
strategy of it. 


GREENFIELD: Do you agree 
that people who come to poli- 
tics from other jobs-the nonpro- 

fessional politicians- are more willing 
to be who they are? You've had careers 
as an actor and a law- 
yer. Chuck Hagel had 
people shooting at him 
in Vietnam and then 
was a restaurateur. Bob 
Kerrey also had people 
shooting at him and 
then had a business career. We all know 
John McCain's story. Bill Bradley had adu- 
lation on the basketball court before he 
could vote. You guys have this other life. 
If you go down 10 points in your approval 
rating, it isn't as if you've lost, 


THOMPSON: | also think those who don't 
plan to be in the political eame all their 
life can have an additional layer of inde- 
pendence. It's why I'm the last remaining 
Republican in favor of term limits. No one 
wants to tackle the entitlement issues 
and things of that nature, but eventually 
it's going to fall on somebody's doorstep 


big-time. We'll have to do it. It's not a 
lack of knowledge that keeps them from 
being addressed; there's a lack of will, 
People who had a life and career before 
politics and may very well go back to 
that life have a measure of indepen- 
dence, That's reflected in your votes, your 
demeanor, your candor and your willing- 
ness to take some risks. 


GREENFIELD: Does a fickle electorate 
get what it deserves? 

THOMPSON: We bemoan the lack of can- 
dor, we call for candor, and then we punish 
it. But if you have a reputation for speak- 
ing off-the-cuff, people cut you some 
slack. People don't have a lot of regard 
for politicians, but they don't have a lot 
for reporters, either. It's an even fight. 


GREENFIELD: Of course, some politicians 
simply talk too much. | spoke to one sen- 
ator who told me he has gone up to Joe 
Biden and said, more or less, "Why don't 
you shut up once in a while?" 


THOMPSON: Joe's a good example. | have 
a simple theory about it: He can't help it. 
Why he can't help it, | don't know, but he 
can't. It's hard to explain. He's one of the 
smartest guys around, but when he puts 
on his senatorial hat, there is no excess 
he won't exceed. 

GREENFIELD: Let's take a serious issue- 
terrorism or base closings- tough, contro- 
versial stuff regarding national security. 
For a big important issue, Congress 
always forms a commission-an outside, 
independent body-to discuss it. Why is 
that? These are things Congress itself is 
supposed to address. 

THOMPSON: Individual members don't 
go into a hearing anymore with the idea, 
Let's find out what happened. They go in 
thinking, How best can | make my case 
for my party? They make their long open- 
ing statements before any witness is 
heard. But this is a hearing! It's designed 
to find stuff out. Some of these guys 
never return after they make their open- 
ing statements. "I'm taking this oppor- 
tunity to let you know how I've already 
prejudged this matter." 

GREENFIELD: Don't you think people 
would get this by now, that it would be 
clear to politicians that 10-minute, toga- 
grabbing speeches are disastrous? By 
contrast, the straight shooters-people 
who speak clear and concise English- 
look good. People understand we're in 
a post-rhetorical age, and the fancy- 
dance speeches sound pompous. Why 
doesn't it sink in? 

THOMPSON: It will when it's proven to be 
successful. Somebody's got to break the 


mold. But as | said earlier, it's perceived 
as highly risky. What about a politician 
saying, "I don't know” or "You know, | 
haven't really thought about that yet"? 
How about being honest rather than hav- 
ing answers for everything? I think people 
may like hearing the truth, someone say- 
ing, “I just don't know." 

GREENFIELD: Most politicians don't start 
out this way, do they? 

THOMPSON: Some people have been 
at the game for a long time and have 
literally forgotten what they believed. 
Generally, as a politician, to be success- 
ful in your own state, then to be suc- 
cessful with the caucus and then to be 
successful with the primary voter, you find 
yourself getting further and further away 
from the reason you ran in the first place. 
GREENFIELD: Ted Koppel loves to say. 
"The most important thing in politics is 
sincerity, and if you can fake that, you 
have it made." 


THOMPSON: Yeah, and if your primary 
goal in life is to balance competing con- 
stituents, it shows in your language and 
demeanor. Instead, if people risked tak- 
ing hard stands, they could gain some- 
thing even if they lost something in terms 
of special interest groups. | think people 
like me because I raised a little hell every 
once in a while. The more I did it, the bet- 
ter. It wasn't in presidential politics, but 
somebody has to take the risk and give 
the people a chance to reward real can- 
dor. They need an attitude that doesn't 
scream, “I've gotta have this job." | think 
that's probably the best thine Bush had. 
He was as scripted as anybody else, but 
it didn't seem as though he was. He gave 
the impression that he could take it or 
leave it. He worked like hell to create 
that impression. 


GREENFIELD: Some people say to judge 
a politician, you should turn the sound 
down. Don't even listen. Give a 10-second 
look and you'll know. 


THOMPSON: ! decide within 30 seconds 
whether I like a guy. | don't know what 
party he is. | don't know what his beliefs 
are. You feel as if you know whether the 
guy believes what he's saying, whether 
he is sincere, whether he's just another 
manufactured politician. In the future 
the person who steps out from all that 
protective coating will have something 
special going for him. 

GREENFIELD: A couple of years ago Mike 
Bloomberg-now an independent-was 
asked if he'd ever smoked marijuana. 
The typical ploy is to evade it or say, "I 
tried it and didn't like it." He said, "You 


bet, and | enjoyed it." That was New 
York. But beyond New York, | always 
thought the public would say, "Son of 
a bitch is telling the truth." What if he 
pointed out that alcohol has caused far 
more harm than marijuana? "He's tell- 
ing me what he really thinks. And not 
only that- һе may be right." 


THOMPSON: | don't care if a guy fesses 
up to smoking marijuana or not. | think 
some issues are clear—51 percent clear, 
others maybe 90 percent clear. Then 
there are issues we have to take on. 
Bush is to be commended for raising the 
debate on Social Security. You can argue 
about how you'd do it and so forth, but 
he took it on, Let's take that and health 
care. | haven't studied health care enough 
to have a totally locked-in opinion on it, 
but here's the question: How in the world 
are we going to take care of our obliga- 
tions-these entitlements-in addition to 
our country's defense? Look at what's 
happening economically in France. Look 
at what is happening in Germany. That's 
where we're going to be in a few years. 
It's the result of years of failing to speak 
the obvious truth. It's the result of years 
of playing to constituent groups. You can 
continue spending increasing amounts 
only until it catches up with you. It will run 
you into the ground. Well, it's where we're 
headed, and everybody knows that. 


GREENFIELD: In the first part of some 
of Winston Churchill's great speeches he 
laid out how horrible things were going 
to be. One of his first speeches as prime 
minister essentially began, “I've come 
here to tell you about the disaster we've 
just had at Dunkirk. I'm here to tell you 
just how wretched the planning was." 


THOMPSON: If we were doing the right 
thing, we would ditch 75 percent of what 
Congress has on its plate and focus on a 
handful of things like Social Security and 
health care. They are tough and diffi- 
cult, but that's what | want to hear from 
these guys. | care about these issues. 
Someone has to look the American peo- 
ple in the eye and say, "This is the deal." 
You have to be able to stand up to your 
most avid supporters who are saying, 
"Look, I'm counting on this judgeship" 
or "I'm counting on these contracts" or 
"|'m counting on my son being assis- 
tant secretary of whatnot after | gave so 
much money to you." You have to stand 
up to all that. And that's from your 
people-what about your detractors? 
The pressure is tremendous 

for someone who wants to 

move up the ranks. But it's 

going to have to be done. 


“So would you like to start with a leg, a breast or some turkey?” 


99 


0) and custom jeans are by VALE 
hoes ($525) are by FRATELLI ROS 


re 
У 


| ч SKI JACKETS ARE FOR THE SLOPES. FIGHT THE EIC CHILL IN STYLE 
Ri hé 5 XU Left: His jacket ($395) and sweater ($295) are by NICOLE FARHI. Center: His jacket (52,800), 
n Shirt ($500) and tie ($220) are by BOTTEGA VENETA. Right: His coat ($3,300) and shirt ($260) are by 

м ERMENEGILDO ZEGNA. His sunglasses ($260) are by JEE VICE. 


¿THE PEACOAT: А CLASSIC ON THE WATERFRONT OR IN MIDTOWN 


Left: Her cape (52,800) and dress ($2,195) are by BRUNO GRIZZO. His coat ($3,600), sweater ($790), shirt ($250), tie ($145), pants ($315), gloves 
($350) and bag ($1,200) are by SALVATORE FERRAGAMO. Center: Her coat ($795) is by BOSS ORANGE. Her skirt ($345) is by HUGO. Her shoes 
are by ROBERTO CAVALLI. His pants ($315) are by SALVATORE FERRAGAMO. His shoes ($580) are by FRATELLI ROSSETTI. 
"Right: Her cape ($2,800) is by BRUNO GRIZZO, His coat ($3,600), pants ($315), gloves ($350) and bag ($1,200) are by SALVATORE FERRAGAMO. 


UNLESS YOU ARE А ТОР GUN, LEATHER JACKETS SHOULD HAVE SOME LENGTH 


Left: Her jacket ($1,500) is by BRUNO GRIZZO. Her dress ($540) is by NICHOLAS К. His jacket ($4,195), shirt ($695) 
and pants ($995) are by GIORGIO ARMANI. Center: His coat ($7,500), sweater-vest ($940), shirt (5280) and pants ($332) are by BRIONI. 
His shoes ($140) are by GEOX. Right: His coat ($1,595), sweater ($500), shirt ($270) and tie ($125) and her dress ($940) are by ETRO. 


ON THE ROAD, TIGHTLY WOVEN COATS PROVIDE WARMTH WITHOUT BULK 


Left: His coat ($1,895) is by PRADA. Right: His pants ($330) are by VALENTINO. | 
His shoes ($495) are by HARRYS OF LONDON. | 


FORGET THE NUTTY PROFESSOR: A MAN IN TWEED ALWAYS GETS THE GIRL 


Left: Her sweater ($380) is by AGNES B. His sweater ($1,780) is by VALENTINO. 
His watch ($10,500) is by HUBLOT. Right: His coat ($1,695), sweater ($598), shirt ($225), pants ($225) and tie ($135) 
are by JOHN VARVATOS. Her coat ($2,975) is by MALO. 


A CASHMERE COAT GIVES A SOFT TOUCH DURING THOSE CLOSE ENCOUNTERS 


From left: Her jacket ($2,195) is by HUGO. His coat ($1,145) is by JUST CAVALLI, his suit ($1,175) is by GF FERRE, | 
his sweater ($670) is by ERMENEGILDO ZEGNA, and his shirt (5225) is by JOHN VARVATOS. His coat ($1,295), jacket ($450) and 
sweater ($350) are by ARNOLD BRANT, and his scarf ($525) is by SEAWARD 5 STEARN OF LONDON. Her coat ($3,245) 
is by ETRO, and her blouse ($285) is by C'N'C. Right: His coat ($3,510), sweater ($1,780), jeans ($330) and boots ($530) are by VALENTINO. 
Her coat ($585), top ($190) and pants (5360) are by WE ARE REPLAY. Her boots ($920) are by JUST CAVALLI. 


P е, <. 
RA 


Her dress ($1,325) is by DSQUARED. Her shoes are by ROBERTO CAVALLI. His coat ($2,500), shi 
are by YOHJI YAMAMOTO. His boots ( 2 by DR. MARTENS FOR ҮОНЈІ YA 


СЕМА 


AT HOME WITH CHUCK LIDDELL, THE UFC'S BIGGEST ASSET 


EY LUCIUS SHEPARD 


ess than two minutes into his fight aeainst Quinton Jackson this past May, Chuck "the Iceman" 
„ p Liddell made a mistake. He slid to Jackson's side and threw a hook to his body, a maneuver that 


left him open for Jackson's counter: a right hand that put Liddell on his back. In a sport like mixed mar- 
tial arts, or MMA, in which the combatants punch each other with four- to six-ounce gloves, there is 
only a small margin for error. Seconds later, after Liddell had taken four unanswered strikes to his head, 
referee Bie John McCarthy intervened, and Liddell lost his aura of invincibility and his Ultimate Fighting 
Championship light-heavyweight title. 

"It's something I've gotten away with before,” says Liddell, referring to the mistake. He adds that his 
longtime friend and trainer John Hackleman had told him that "if | kept doing it, I'd get caught sooner or 
later. This time | got caught." 

Usually such stoppages are met with an exultant roar, but there were mostly boos after this one, and 
the majority of the crowd, including Adam Sandler, Andre Agassi, David Spade and a small army of other 
celebrities, sat stunned. They had come to watch Liddell celebrate anothervictory in the Octagon. His win- 
ning streak dated back to 2004, and though Jackson had been the last man to defeat him, it was generally 
felt that Jackson was in decline and Liddell was at the top of his game. The fight's outcome was thought 
by many to be a fait accompli, a step toward bigger and better things for Liddell. 
ing to Jackson, the 37-year-old Liddell seems to have forfeited none of his immense appeal. About a week after the 
е appeared on Late Show, bantering with David Letterman, amiably handling questions about the loss and stating his 
"й eagerness for a rematch. Rendered menacing by the Mohawk he then sported, a scalp tattoo-Chinese characters that mean 
mace of peace and prosperity"~and a carefully sculpted goatee, he was still the face of the UFC, glowering from a number of 
T-shirts and posters. He remains the most visible fighter in the sport, the first true crossover figure to emerge from MMA, 

Dana White, the UFC president, attributes Liddell's mainstream popularity to "his laid-back personality and a Tysonesque 
presence" inside the Octagon. 

"When we're in New York, Chuck gets mobbed,” White says. “I have to pull him away or he'd be signing autographs all day.” 

Brad Marks, Liddell's friend and manager, says, "Chuck's personality is different from the way it is perceived. He's good- 
natured and incredibly funny. If he decides to do movies after his career, he has all the tools to be the next big action star. | 
think in 20 years we'll look back and appreciate the way he brought the UFC into the mainstream." 

Once characterized as an outlaw sport and famously labeled "human cockfighting" by Senator John McCain, ММА is often called 
the fastest-growing sport on the planet. UFC programming is shown in more than 30 countries, and last year its pay-per-view revenue 
was reportedly more than $200 million, putting it on a par with World Wrestling Entertainment and boxing. This has been achieved 
through savvy marketing that targets the young male demographic and spices up the product with sexy women and celebrities. (Movie 

stars and rap artists who once eravitated to major boxing cards now flock to UFC events.) But the most important marketing tool, 

the one that put it over the top, is the reality show The Ultimate Fighter. A combination of Survivor and Big Brother, the show _ 
places two teams of fighters in the same Las Vegas house, where they sleep, eat and otherwise interact while training and 
competing in a 13-week elimination tournament. The grand prize is a six-figure, a s eoram me UFC - ә 


MH 


106 


The first-season coaches were Liddell and 
Randy Couture, who at the beginning of 
2005 was the light-heavyweight champ. 

"| knew the UFC was going to explode 
after the reality show," Liddell says. "We 
had the right people on it. You could feel 
it was going to happen.” 

Spike TV, the cable channel that carries 
the show, wasn't that confident: It report- 
edly demanded that UFC bear the produc- 
tion costs for the initial season. 

Liddell and Couture (whom Liddell 
describes as "a class act,” though he won't 
say they are friends) rarely spoke during the 
show and saw each other only at the chal- 
lenges. Liddell believes their competitiveness 
fed into the fighters' psyches, amped up their 
ferocity and thus helped boost the ratings. 

Couture, a member of the sport's 
Hall of Fame, is proof that losing in 
the Octagon does not carry the stigma 
it does, say, in the boxing ring. He has 
lost eight times in vari- 
ous MMA bouts, twice by 
knockout to Liddell. Jack- 
son has lost six times, 
including two brutal 
knockouts at the hands 
of Wanderlei Silva. Silva 
has since been TKO'd by 
Dan Henderson, who has 
been named the next 
challenger for Jackson's 
title; Henderson has lost 
five times but now holds 
both the middleweight 
and welterweight belts 
in Pride, another MMA 
organization, which was 
recently purchased by 
UFC. Very little separates 
the elite fighters. 

"It only takes one mis- 
take,” says Liddell. 

In person, at his 
house in San Luis Obispo 
(SLO-as in slow-to the 
locals), Liddell is not so intimidating. In 
contrast to his posters-which empha- 
size the thickness of his neck, the jut of 
his jaw and the muscles of his chest and 
arms- in casual dress he looks almost 
slight, and when he walks downhill or 
downstairs, he steps delicately, as if he 
has pebbles in his sandals. His toenails 
are painted black, a fashion statement 
he picked up from Hackleman. He erins 
frequently, and at times his sandpa- 
pery voice becomes nearly inaudible. He 
recently returned from a promotional 
tour he made on behalf of the movie 
300, in which he plays a small role, and 
| ask how he and the voice held up under 
the stress of nonstop interviews. 

"It was all right,” he says. "No matter 
how many people you meet in any one 
day, you just have to remember it's the 
first time they're meeting you.” 

| bring up Liddell's Good Morning Texas 
appearance on the tour, during which he 


slurred his words, rambled and seemed at 
one point to fall asleep. The video has been 
replayed countless times on YouTube, and the 
Internet was full of drug-abuse rumors. 

Liddell grimaces, saying, "Hell, I 
thought it was pretty funny myself when 
| saw it. | was sick, and | hadn't been get- 
ting much sleep. My doctor said he could 
tell | had pneumonia just from touch- 
ing my skin. | took Lunesta and a dose 
of NyQuil before going to bed, and then 
they woke me up after three hours.” 

The UFC thereupon pulled him off the 
road to be tested for drugs. "They know 1 
don't use drugs,” he says, “but I didn't say 
anything until after the test came back. 
Then | told them what I thought.” 

We're preparing to drive to Hackleman’s 
place for a training session. By way of a 
segue, | mention that White has been 
quoted as saying the first meeting between 
Liddell and Hackleman, in 1991, was like 


"I'M A CONFIDENT FIGHTER,” SAYS LIDDELL. "I KNOW I'VE GOT THE POWER 
TO FINISH A FIGHT, EVEN IN THE LAST MINUTE OF THE LAST ROUND.” 


something out of a chop-socky movie. 

Liddell gives the notion a tum or two. “Yeah, 
| guess,” he says. "| went out to John's place to 
see if he'd train me. You had to prove you were 
tough enough to train with John. We boxed for 
18 straight minutes. He basically whipped 
my ass. It was raining, and I'd driven out on 
a motorcycle; afterward he asked, 'You com- 
ing back tomorrow?" | said, 'Yeah; and he 
tossed me his car keys and said, 'Take my 
truck! | said | could handle the rain, and he 
said, 'No, go on. Take my truck!” 

It's not exactly Kung Fu, but I figure 
if you were to wipe off the Hollywood 
glaze, the relationship between Grass- 
hopper and Master Kan would prove to 
be considerably less Zen koan than it 
was depicted. "Take my truck" is likely 
more reflective of the general tone. 


Hackleman's home is in the country near 
the town of Arroyo Grande, up a dirt drive- 
way on a piney, isolated hillside. A friendly 


dog with a eame leg sniffs our tires as we 
climb out of Liddell's Hummer H2. Cool 
breezes lift the pine boughs. Firewood is 
stacked against a shed. It seems like the 
kind of place where you might expect an 
old hippie with a gray beard bibbing his 
overalls to stroll from behind an out- 
building, toting a sack full of freshly 
harvested bud. This bucolic illusion is 
shattered, however, when Hackleman 
emerges from the house, brandishing a 
sledgehammer over his head. 

“Got the new 20-pound hammers,” 
he shouts and offers to let Jason Von 
Flue, another UFC fighter who has just 
arrived, hold it. 

Von Flue declines, saying, "I don't want 
to touch И. It looks nasty.” 

In his late 405, with a shaved head and 
a salt-and-pepper goatee, Hackleman is 
aggressively genial and gleefully profane. 
After some more business with the ham- 
mer, he tells a story about 
interrupting his morn- 
ing sex to call a friend, a 
philosophy professor, to 
settle a matter concern- 
ing Logos and pathos, 
two modes of persuasion 
in rhetoric. He then gen- 
tly ridicules my function 
as a writer, comparing it 
to being the pitcher on a 
Wiffle-ball team. 

"I don't know, John,” says 
Liddell with a grin. "The 
pitcher's the most impor- 
tant player in Wiffle ball.” 

Hackleman runs his pro- 
gram more like a martial- 
arts school than most 
fight teams do. “I love my 
team, but | won't tolerate 
any talking back,” he says. 
“No attitude. | don't care 
if you're a big star making 
millions, You give me atti- 
tude, I'll drop you flat. | demand respect, 
and | expect everyone to respect everyone 
else. But we have some fun out here.” 

He talks about how, years ago, he and 
Liddell would ride their motorcycles from 
gym to gym in the area, looking for com- 
petition, "It was in vain,” he says. "They 
were good at what they did, but..." He 
breaks off his thought, the implication 
being that fighters from other eyms 
couldn't hang with him and Liddell. 

When asked if Liddell, who once 
worked as a bouncer in SLO, used to get 
into a lot of street fights, he says, "He 
got into the usual trouble that those of 
us who are fighters do, but he was always 
a tough, levelheaded kid." 

At first this strikes me as evasive, but | 
decide it's actually on point. Most of the 
fighters уе met in SLO have a leonine self- 
assurance and ease of bearing that | assume 
are marks of the profession. Even Hackleman 
and Liddell, (contínued on page 131) 


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107 


108 


THE END OF THE WORLD JUST MAY BE THE 
GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH, ANDAWHACKED- 
OUT TRIPSTER IS FIRST IN LINE TO BE THE MC 


his world would end. The brink beckoned. A bright guy 
might as well pick a date. Gunderson had. A revolution in 
consciousness, the peaceful dismantling of all man's cruel 
machinery, was, according to his interpretation of an inter- 
pretation of a pre-Columbian codex, half a decade away. But that was 
merely one unfolding. Alternate endings included fire, flooding, pox, 
nukes. Homo sapiens had a few years to choose. Was that time enough? 
Gunderson figured it was, at least for him. Time enough for another 
book, some lecture tours, a premium-cable show. Time enough to sam- 
ple all the yearning young hippie tang in questing creation (or our 
limited perception of it). Maybe too much time. A guy could unravel. 
Gunderson hadn't picked the date out of his favorite alpaca hat. 
January 5 in the Julian calendar was a major day in Mixtec prophecy. 
These bejeweled dudes had played their proto-basketball to the death, 
wom the skins of enemy slain. Probably they'd known something. 
Gunderson didn't know much about them, really, but who cared? That 
their glyphs foretold an imminent global shift was clearly enough for 
Ramón, the shaman Gunderson had been visiting these last several 
winters. You could be damn sure it was good enough for Gunderson. 
Besides, he'd never claimed the earth would crack open, just that 
something huge was on deck and ifwe didn't evolve our asses quick, 
it would be bad huge. A reasonable message, if a bit vague. Surpris- 
ing how many preferred not to hear it. These were maybe the same 
folk who pretended crop circles were teen pranks, the fools who 
called him fool. Look around, he wanted to say, did say, to gather- 
ings in the many hundreds, to panting patchouli girls and home 
chemists, to consciousness pimps and wireless kabbalists, to, in short, 
all the nonfools, the happy excellent few willing to be deranged by 
their knowing, thrilled to press up to where Gunderson perched in 
loose lotus and designer tunic under the track lights of a bookstore 
or small theater, a rangy Buddha with new beautiful teeth. 
"Look around," he'd say, and they would, as though exemplars of 
the encroaching gnarlitude were doing (continued on page 118) 


ILLUSTRATION BY ALEX GROSS 


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BUNNIES 


Chicago Tribune in 1959 

that sought "the 30 most 
beautiful girls in Chicagoland" 
to staff a new after-hours play- 
ground. A few months later, 
when Hugh Hefner opened the 
doors of the first Playboy Club, 
the world saw what the ad 
was after: the Playboy Bunny. 
“Chicago has become the sex- 
symbol capital of the United 
States," wrote columnist Art 
Buchwald. “The new American 
pinup has rabbit ears," gushed 
Paris Match. Soon there were 
Clubs from Los Angeles to 
Tokyo, and the Bunny's place 
in history was cemented. She 
was a sex symbol and cultural 
icon for the ages. 

Over the years the after- 
hours scene changed, and 
imitators crowded the field; in 
the 1980s the Clubs closed. 


[: all began with an ad in the 


ARE BACK 


NEW FANTASIES—IN THE FLESH AND AT YOUR SERVICE 


2 


PHOTOGRAPHY BY ARNY FREYTAG 


But in 2006 Hef saw the time 
was ripe for a return. He 
launched a new Playboy Club 
at the Palms in Las Vegas. 
Modern classic in decor, it is 
a place where Sinatra’s ghost 
mingles with today's models, 
musicians and celebs. Natu- 
rally, the Club is staffed with 
the most beautiful girls in 
Vegasland. They are the new 
Bunnies, in uniforms recon- 
ceived by the great Roberto 
Cavalli. Want to meet some of 
the girls? We figured you did. 
Right this way. 


Opposite page: Lindsey would like to 
launch her own clothing boutique some- 
day. We like what she's wecring in this 
shot. Above: Denise hos career ombi- 
tions too: "| want to remain a Bunny 
extraordinaire! It’s a dream come true.” 
Left: Jessica shows her face card at 
the Vegas Playboy Club's grand open- 
ing on October 6, 2006. 


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Opposite page: Meet beautiful blackjack dealer Patty, What's the only thing г Cates À 
that beats a 21? A pair of 34Ds. Top and above left: Chandella sure does EST . 


know how to serve. She's a cocktail waitress and a former competitive ten- PT M. or es 


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nis ployer. Right and above right: We caught up with Kristy while she was Ж. MO" e Bir 
faking а shower—good, clean fun. She fits right in in Vegas. Not only is AE tg aad Big ROS 
she o blackjack dealer, she has played in her share of poker tournaments dor کی و‎ A 


on the Strip. "1 love Vegas," she says. "There's always a party to go fo.” e ا ا‎ 


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Above: Charity is from a small town in Texas with one blinking light and a population of 500. The craziest thing she's seen while dealing blackjack 
at the Playboy Club? “Once a guy came in with a huge pocketful of chocolate chips," she says (she's talking about $5,000 Vegas chips, not the 
Nestlé morsels). "He had the equivalent of a small house in his pocket.” Below: When not working ct the Club, Denise is a host on the web-TV 
channel RawVegas.tv. Opposite page: Taina loves movies and champagne, at the same time. Her favorites? Fargo and Cristal. 


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Left: Sharia is an expert skier. What's more fun, being a snow bunny or a Playboy Bunny? “That's a dumb question,” she says, laughing. The craziest thing that's 
ever happened fo her at the Club? "A guy wanted to buy my Cavalli ears, tail and cuffs for $1,000," she says. Did she sell them? "Not a chance!” 


— 
See more Bunnies at cyber.playboy.com. 


Right: You may have guessed from her toned body and suntanned skin that Cerra is an outdoorsy girl. She likes mountain biking, snowboarding, dirt biking 
and hiking. She does all right indoors, too. Take a look at these two beauties. Have you bought your ticket to Vegas yet? What's stopping you? 


PLAYBOY 


118 


GUNDERSON 


(continued from page 108) 
goblin dances in the very room. “Look at 
the world, what's going on in the world. 
Oppression, repression, depression, the 
middle this, the Western that, everything 
melting, burning, sick. It's no coinci- 
dence, it's prophecy, and prophecy is no 
joke, no matter what some cool shill for 
the corporations might tell you. Trust 
me, I used to be one of those shills. Until 
I got my head handed to me on a plate. 
Or, to be honest, in a bowl. A bowl full of 
the foulest soup you ever tasted. Vision 
gumbo. Best gift I ever got. Six years, 
people. We've got six years to find the 
better path. Or we are guaranteed one of 
the utmost, outmost shittiness." 

Once, one of the girls who invariably fol- 
lowed him home from these gigs (a Gospel 
of Thomas fan named Nellie, now his cur- 
rent sintern), while getting positively gnos- 
tic on his fun parts with ballerina slippers 
she'd happened to have in her bag, asked 
Gunderson if he ever looked out on the 
crowd, thought, Suckers. 

"Never," said Gunderson, remember- 
ing the ballet school his mother used to 
do the books for back in Oregon, those 
Danskined dryads cavorting in the musty, 
light-shot corridor where he waited for 
his mother to drive him home. 

"Never?" said Nellie, her insteps rub- 
bing him toward some murked glimpse 
of the Demiurge. 

"You don't get it," said Gunderson, 
panting himself now. "This is no con." 

"No shit?” 

None at all, and he had to get the word 
out. He considered it his duty to reach eye- 
balls. A heads-up for species-wide calamity 
deserved eyeballs. So he was a little on 
edge, on brink. He stood at the counter at 
Gray's Papaya on 72nd Street in Manhat- 
tan, waiting for a call from his manager, 
who was waiting for a call from his agent, 
who was waiting for a call from the TV 
people. He'd pitched them like some 
puma-headed god of pitching a few days 
before, laid waste to that conference room, 
but now there were concerns. They wanted 
to be certain Gunderson truly believed in 
his vision, that it wasn't a gag. Otherwise, 
the Untitled Gunderson Prophecy Project 
would make for lousy television. But how 
could a rad Siddhartha who roved the 
earth quaffing potions in its most sacred 
places, and boning its most radiant crea- 
tures, not to mention rallying humanity 
for one last stand against its own worst 
urges, make for lousy television? 

Bastards were insulting him, and 
Gunderson could feel that hunched, bile- 
sopped culture troll he'd been, that 
devolved little prick he'd purged with iboga 
root and Jung, burble up. Fine and dandy. 
Burble on, pal. The old Gunderson, 
Gunderson knew, would never really go 
away. He'd just have to be endured, like 


some incorrigible junkie brother everybody 
in the family hopes will just die already. 

Even now the old Gunderson creature 
hovered close, craved, for instance, those 
glistening turd tubes on the Gray's grill 
rollers. A spot of mustard, some evil-spirit 
infestation, a medium coronary. De-lish. 
Meanwhile the street stinker at the coun- 
ter beside him—smeary duster, foam- 
and-twine sandals—wolfed down a 
jumbo, shot Gunderson one of those poi- 
gnantly exasperated looks homeless nut- 
jobs master, the one that says, "Wake me 
when they switch off the hologram." 
Orphaned schizo cast out by the corpo- 
rate state? Avatar of an ancient sage? 
Both? You never knew, but plenty of ava- 
tars were too burnt to be useful anyhow. 

Some were as bad off as the old 
Gunderson. 

Now the new and improved Gunder- 
son sipped his papaya juice. Fairly toxic, 
this stuff too, but he gave himself a pass. 
During a recent DMT excursion in his ex- 
wife's loft, while Nellie wept and shivered 
in the linen closet, the machine elves, or 
rather this one disco Magoo in particular, 
a squat, faintly buzzing fellow with scal- 
loped gold skin and emerald eyes who'd 
become something of a mentor to Gunder- 
son, ordered him to ease up. 

"Relax," Baltran had said, slithered 
up from his usual crevasse in the sofa 
cushions. "You're doing great. You're on 
the verge of serious revelations. Highest 
clearance imaginable. But you're wound 
too tight. Get a massage or something. 
Rolfing's fun. Stay loose for the coming 
astonishments. Don't be a fuckrod.” 

He didn't intend to be a fuckrod. He 
intended to stay loose, stay on his toes, 
whatever Baltran and his kind required. 
They'd chosen him, and this message was 
too important to be left to anybody else, no 
matter how much he lectured at various 
symposia about dialogue and communal 
deliverance. He had to be certain no fuck- 
rods lurked in his vicinity, either. Maybe he 
should fire his manager. No sooner had he 
thought the phrase ftre my manager, than 
Gerry's name blinked in his hand. Coina- 
dence was a concept for sheep. 

"What have you got?" said Gunder- 
son, stepped out to the sidewalk. 

"Everything's still in play," said Gerry. 

Gunderson's eyes strayed to the 
Gray's sign on the building's facade: 
WHEN YOU'RE HUNGRY, OR BROKE, OR JUST 
IN A HURRY. NO GIMMICKS. NO BULL. 

There wasalways a gimmick. The gim- 
mick here was you ate factory-sealed pig 
lips and the hologram never ended. 

"Everything's still in play? That's a 
good one for your tombstone." 

"And I trust your judgment in such a 
delicate matter. Anyway, the series divi- 
sion is still meeting, but my guy there, 
my mole, don't you love it, says there 
will be an offer by the end of the day. 
They nolonger have the aforementioned 


concerns. They believe you believe." 

"Good." 

"More than Pd 

"Do you believe I believe, Gerry?” 

“I believe in solid, serious offers.” 

"Fair enough, Gerry. Because I don't 
care about the money." 

"I know, I know. How about you take 
my cut and I take yours.” 

"I would, my friend. The money's 
not for me. It's for Carlos." 

"How is the boy?" 

"He's beautiful, Gerry. A beautiful 
child." 

"Seen him lately?" 

"Victoria nagging you again? I'm 
sorry about that. But you can't listen to 
all her crap. I see him plenty." 

Now the reeking avatar staggered out 
of Gray's Papaya, waved his ragged 
arms. 

"Hold on, Gerry." 

Gunderson dug in his coat for some 
loose bills. 

“Hey, buddy..." he said. 

"Keep your papes!” screamed the avatar. 
Particulate of frankfurter and a fine gin 
mist sprayed out of his pink mouth. “I want 
your goddamn soul! Mean to munch it!" 

"Pardon?" said Gunderson. 

"Your soul wienie! That's the real- 
ass jumbo!" 

Doubtless on the astral plane, or even 
just an outer ring of Saturn, this man 
was delivering space-riffling sermons to 
sentient manifestations of light, but on 
this plane, at 72nd and Amsterdam to be 
precise, Gunderson had to fucking go. 


Maybe he wasn't such a bright guy. Victo- 
ria's divorce lawyer probably hadn't 
thought so when he brought Gunderson 
to ruin, or, rather, to Queens. His studio in 
Jackson Heights was suitable for the com- 
position of prison manifestos, but Gunder- 
son was long past garret-pacing histrionics. 
He'd already written his book. He'd been 
on the talk shows, the campus panels. A 
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame rock star kept 
inviting him up for a helicopter ride. 

The Queens studio was fine for hippie 
tang sessions, but it was not the apartment 
of a generational touchstone. But here he 
stood within the chipped stucco walls of 
his Jackson hole, beneath the hideous 
chandelier. He was lying on the futon after 
smoking some of the alpha weed, a gift 
from one of Nellie's rich friends, when he 
felt an odd prodding in his spine. He 
stood, peeled back the mattress. 

"Baltran." 

The machine elf's head poked 
through the futon frame's cheap slats. 
Most of his body seemed morphed with 
the hardwood floor. 

“What the fuck, Gunderson? It smells 
like sad, lonely man in here.” 

His buzzing seemed even fainter, His 
scallops bore an odd magenta tint. 


"I thought things were going really well until you complained about the turkey." 


PLA Y S8 OT 


"I'm behind on laundry." 

"Are you behind on ass wiping, too?" 

Things had, in fact, grown a wee 
degraded. That's why he still spent as 
much time as he could in Victoria's loft. 
Psychologists, probably, would offer nega- 
tive explanations for Victoria's failure to 
change the locks, but Gunderson preferred 
to see it as evidence of her personal evolu- 
tion. Guilt for the skill of her lawyer, too. 

"Look, buddy," said Baltran, “ме 
have to talk." 

"The TV thing? I'm close. I think it has a 
real chance to be a wake-up call for——" 

“It's about the prophecy." 

"What about it?" 

"The math needs a little tweaking." 

"Meaning what? It's not six years?" 

"Not quite." 

"What do you mean not quite?" 

Baltran fell buzzless for a moment. This 
happened sometimes. Though his image 
remained, it was as though the essence of 
the elf were no longer present. He was 
perhaps being called away for an impor- 
tant sit-down in another dimension. He'd 
be back. Baltran always came back. But 
Gunderson wanted him back right now. 

"What do you mean not quite?" 
Gunderson said once more, lunged. His 
hand sliced through light. 

"Fucking watch it, pal," the elf said, 
here again suddenly. "You know I can 
feel that. It hurts." 

"Sorry." 

“It's okay. I didn't mean to make you 
nervous. You've still got a few months." 

"A few months?" 

“That's time enough. Why don't you 
patch things up with Ramón?" 

“I've got no problem with Ramón." 

"Besides the fact that you don't talk 
to him." 

“He doesn't talk to me." 


“It’s your business, I guess. Now get 
out there and effect some goddamn evo- 
lution. Do me proud." 

"How do I do that?" 

But he was gone and left Gunderson to 
worry. Sure, money was everywhere as 
long as you didn't covet it, but there was 
the old Gunderson, that batshit moron. 
He might be coveting on the down low, 
screwing them both. Maybe it was the ves- 
tigial Gunderson who'd cut off Ramón 
when the shaman started asking questions 
about the television deal too. Probably just 
wanted a new roof for his hut. Well, unless 
Gunderson got the message out, Ramón 
wouldn't need a roof. Nobody would. 
There just wasn't time to waste working 
out the licensing on a prophecy. 

Victoria was in Lisbon for a fado festi- 
val, and Carlos was with her parents in 
Maine, so Gunderson had full run of the 
pad he'd traded in for penile liberation. 
Part of the charge of pending apocalypse, 
he understood, was the knowledge that 
Victoria wouldn't get to enjoy this square 
footage much longer. 

Maybe he wasn't such a bright guy for 
other reasons. The treatise one of his aco- 
lytes at Oxford had just sent him was 
dense going, especially in Victoria's desk- 
top's antiquated text format. Here were 
Isaac Luria and Madame Blavatsky, there 
a block of dingbats. Gunderson had 
hardly skimmed his philosophy books in 
college. "I get the idea," he would usually 
announce to his dorm suite after a few 
minutes' deep study. "Pour me a drink." 

was a silly word (Baltran said 
only chumps uttered it), and Gunderson 
had detested most of the heavy trippers in 
college. He'd taken hallucinogens just a 
few times, passed those occasions frying 
flapjacks, staring at their scorched, porous 
skins. The only acid eater he could ever 


“Wow! This is really kinky!" 


abide back then was Red Ned, a scrawny 
vet with a rucksack, who appeared at most 
major burner parties and who, in return 
for some My Lar-ish confession and reci- 
tations from The Marx-Engels Reader, got 
free shrooms and beer. 

Once, at a barbecue, Ned cornered 
Gunderson near the dying keg, stuck a 
bottle under the younger man's nose, some 
murky homemade hooch he'd likely dis- 
tilled in one of the old bus station toilets. 

“It’s absinthe,” said Ned, “The mighty 
wormwood. You will eat the devil's pussy 
and suddenly know French." 

"Maybe later," said Gunderson. 

"Maybe later," laughed Ned. "Shit, kid, 
later? Later my platoon will be here, We'll 
slit you at the collarbone, pour fire ants 
in. Then you'll talk." 

I'm happy to talk now, Ned." 

“You don't have anything to tell me 
yet. You haven't witnessed the blind piti- 
less truth of it all. But I have a feeling 
about you. What do you think?" 

“T just want to get laid." 

"I'm good to go," said Ned, gave 
Gunderson what might have been, in 
teethsome years, a toothsome smile. "You 
do tunnel-rat zombie cock?" 

"Got a rule against that." 

"Your loss, son." 

In short, until Gunderson had taken a 
magazine assignment, gone to Mexico to 
drink emetic potions with psychotropic 
turistas, his opinion of hallucinogens was 
that you had to worship jam bands, or 
believe the Army had planted a chip in 
your head, to really enjoy them. 

Hed flown to Oaxaca with a glib lede to 
that effect in his laptop. He returned a con- 
verso, The tales of Hoffmann and the stern 
brain play of Huxley had never enticed 
him, but puking and shitting on a dirt floor 
while Ramón kicked him in the balls and, 
later, sobbing while his dead grandfather 
Mort hovered nearby in a shimmering 
kimono and told Gunderson why he had 
such a tough time being faithful to women 
(it was because Gunderson's mother had 
failed to breast-feed him, and also took too 
much Valium, and there was something 
about being distantly related to Barry Gold- 
water), all this, in aggregate, really did the 
trick. Later he discovered the crotch shots 
were not typical but Ramón's "twist" on the 
ancient ritual. Didn't matter, Gunderson 
was hooked. A few more doses over the 
next several months and he knew his place 
in his family and his place in the universe, 
at least provisionally. 

He also had a vision of the world in a 
few years' time if the current course were 
not corrected. More precisely it was a 
vision of North America, oil-starved, 
waterlogged, millions thronged on the 
soggy byways, fleeing the ghosted sprawls 
of the Republic. He saw his sister gang- 
raped in an abandoned Wal-Mart outside 
Indianapolis. The local warlord, nick- 
named Dee-Kay-En-Wye for the runes on 
his tattered hoodie, smiled as he watched 
his kinsmen go to work. They'd lived in 


PLAYBOY 


Home Appliances their entire lives. 
Strangest of all, Gunderson didn't have a 
sister. This added urgency to his vision. It 
wasn't just about him, or his sister. 

When he'd recovered and told the sha- 
man what he'd seen, Ramón led him to a 
stone hut at the edge of the village. A satel- 
lite dish jutted from the woven roof. Inside 
was a sleeping cot, a computer, a bookshelf 
full of French symbolists. Gunderson 
thought of Red Ned's bus station hooch. 
The shaman, who to Gunderson resembled 
one of those carved-down distance runners 
he'd watched train near his father's house 
in Oregon, slid a large cardboard box with 
copper hasps from beneath the cot. Inside 
was a crumbling facsimile of the storied 
codex. He showed Gunderson the jaguar, 
the sickle, the long solstistic loops. He 
showed him where the reeds ran out. 

"I thought the Maya had the calen- 
dar," said Gunderson. 

"Fuck the Maya," said Ramón. 


Gunderson had never been much for the 
astronomy, the math. His colleagues, his 
rivals, could offer the proofs, the ellipticals, 
the galacticals. Most of them used the Maya 
Tzolkin, and Gunderson was pretty sure 
Ramón's insistence on the Mixtec forecast 
was just an intellectual-property maneuver, 
but he didn't mind. He was trying to save 
the world, and that included not just the 
plants and the animals and the majestic 
rock formations but the people, those meat- 
world parasites who'd built pyramids and 
written concertos and invented cotton gins 
and played video games and performed 
clitorectomies and burned up all the fossil 
fuels and gorged themselves on war and 
corn syrup. Gunderson was a people per- 


son. We just needed new kinds of people. 
We had to start making them right now. 

The other thing that had to start being 
made right now was a serious offer from the 
network. Gunderson was back downtown at 
his favorite organic teahouse, e-mailing a 
fiery message to his ListServ, hinting there 
might soon be an announcement about a 
new interpretation of the codex, a revised 
time frame for the Big Clambake. That 
would light up the old nethernet. His peeps 
didn't need much prompting. Many were 
lonely sorts pining for genuine human con- 
nection, or, short of that, a mob to join. 

So if the series division kept wavering, 
maybe Gunderson could get some grass 
roots going. Grass roots. That had been a 
big word with his father. Still was, Gunder- 
son guessed. He hadn't talked to the man in 
years, Not since his mother died. Why? Ask 
the Aztecs. Gunderson didn't know, not 
really, except that maybe it was hard for 
men to talk to one another, especially fathers 
and sons, at least in this dimension. Jim 
Gunderson was handsome, brave, beloved, 
righteous. How did you talk to a father like 
that, a legendary activist, a lawyer for the 
people, ask him to read your profile of a 
sitcom star, a charismatic CFO? Of course, 
Gunderson's hack days were behind him. 
Why didn't he call now? Because Jim 
Gunderson fought for a better tomorrow 
while his son was rolling the dice on no 
tomorrow at all? No, it was probably just 
the patriarchal agon. The new times 
would not be so burdened. We'd be line 
dancing with metallic gnomes. Gunder- 
son glanced up, tracked the dreadlocked 
teen behind the counter. 

"Can I get more of this beetroot chai?" 

"Of course," said the girl. “ГИ bring 
some right over." 


"The technology on these babies has reached the point where 
we ought to be able to have a few drinks." 


“That's not all you can bring. Damn, 
sister." Gunderson had always subscribed 
to the practical man's theory of seduction: 
Hit on everybody, crudely, constantly. His 
percentages were astonishing. 

“Yeah, you know something," said the 
girl. "I've heard about you." 

"What have you heard?" 

“That you're, like, a genius. But also, 
like, a total pigdog. I don't need that in 
my life right now." 

"You don't need complete physical and 
spiritual liberation?" 

“I need health insurance." 

"That's the hologram talking,” said 
Gunderson, handed her his card. 


Outside, the sun was nearly licking him. 
It really felt like that, the sun the tongue 
of a loyal dog. Extraordinary. He stood 
on the curb with his eyes closed, face 
tilted upward. This was life, its only con- 
ceivable асте. Little Carlos knew. Sweet 
Carlos, who had once stared up at clouds, 
shouted, "Don't rain, little sky!" 

Gunderson was about to call Victoria's 
folks in Maine, something he would nor- 
mally never consider, but here was this 
sudden surge of Carlosity. He had to talk 
to his son on the phone. But as soon as 
he thought the word phone the damn 
thing started to vibrate again. 

“Gerry,” said Gunderson. 

“They're pulling out for now. They want 
you to pitch again in a few months." 

"What? Why?" 

"Who knows? They say they've got 
too much in development, but it's any- 
body's guess. Quality television works 
in mysterious ways." 

“Look, Gerry, things are a little more 
complicated. We don't have a few months. 
We've got to do this thing now." 

"What are you talking about?" 

"The prophecy. There's been a sched- 
uling change." 

"I didn't know that happened with 
prophecies. Aren't they written in stone? 
Wasn't this prophecy, in fact, first written 
in stone?" 

"This isn't funny, Gerry. This is real. ГИ 
do it all myself. ГИ get on my knees and beg 
Victoria for the cash. This has to happen 
right now. I'm through screwing around, 
ГИ get grass roots going. This is not about 
a television show, Gerry. This is about the 
survival of the species. Hell, I don’t even 
know why I care anymore. Maybe it's bet- 
ter if we all go down in flames.” 

“Will you calm down? Let's just wait 
and see what the series division has to say 
in a few weeks and then——" 

“And then you can tell those pigdogs 
to shove it up their——" 

“Jeez, will you relax? Pigdogs?” 

“Relax? Are you telling me to relax? 
You sound like fucking Baltran.” 

“Who's that?” 

“Never mind.” 

"He's not that little jerk repping at“ 

“No, Gerry.” 


PEATYBOT 


124 


"I hope you're not talking to him." 

"I've got to go.” 

Gunderson had an appointment with 
Nellie at the loft. They were supposed to 
go over scheduling. Whenever they went 
over scheduling they tended to wind up 
naked on the carpet Victoria had bought 
on a trip to Tehran. Gunderson worried 
their juices might agitate the dyes. Victo- 
ria would have him jailed. 

After the scheduling meeting he was sup- 
posed to meet the rock star for dinner. He'd 
get a call at the last minute regarding loca- 
tion. That's how rock stars handled sched- 
uling. This one was a refurbished 1970s 
icon, a boomer guru who had traded in his 
tiny spoon for a yoga mat. A few months 
earlier he'd attended one of Gunderson's 
talks at an illegal ayahuasca retreat in Santa 
Fe, stalked Gunderson ever since. People 
sneered at the rock star, his New Age cant, 
his music that was a parody of his old music. 
The man spewed platitudes, certainly, was 
a font of phoniness, but Gunderson still 
thought there was something fascinating 
about him. Or maybe he just liked being 
fawned over by a superannuated icon. 

The one thing you couldn't sneer at was 
the man’s bank. He'd invested his rock-star 
cash in computers back when it counted. 
He could probably, with his petty cash, 
feed the world. Would he spare some 
change to save it? Gunderson would put it 
to him. This could prove a fateful flight. 


That Victoria was not in Lisbon but in what 
was now, and, truthfully, had always been 
her lofi, hers alone, seemed some vicious 
ripple in the continuum, something no 
blood-streaked, rainbow-feathered priest 
could ever have predicted. That she stood 
now on the potentially juice-marred Per- 
sian with Carlos in her arms, bawling at a 
nearly naked Nellie, who had obviously let 


herself in with the key Gunderson had 
given her and, in a perhaps not quite 
humorous enough surrender of pretense, 
shucked off most of her clothes in anticipa- 
tion of their scheduling meeting, signaled 
some kind of apocalyptic rupture in dark 
matter's latticework. 

Not that Gunderson really knew what 
that meant. 

"What the fuck?" shrieked Victoria as 
Gunderson came through the door. "This 
is where you bring your end-times gash?” 

"What happened to Lisbon?" said 
Gunderson. 

"What happened to your self-respect?" 

"What happened to knocking?” said 
Nellie. 

"Knocking?" said Victoria. "It's my house! 
I'm supposed to know my ex-husband is 
meeting a naked slut in my house?” 

"End times is more of a Christian 
thing, honey," said Gunderson. "You 
know I don't subscribe to——" 

"What exactly makes me a slut?" said 
Nellie. "Because I have sex? That's pretty 
retrograde." 

"Look at you," said Victoria. "The sec- 
retary. The home-office screw. Except it's 
not even his home anymore. Talk about 
retrograde. I bet you think stripping is 
liberating too. Is that what you think?" 

“I think you're a shrill narcissist who 
couldn't keep pace with your husband's 
spiritual growth." 

"Is that what he said while he rammed 
you with his world changer? His little 
salamander?" 

"My what!" said Gunderson. "Both of 
you stop it. This is ridiculous." 

"Damn straight," said Nellie. ^I quit." 

Nellie scooped up her clothes, seemed 
about to bolt, but then just stood there, quiv- 
ered oddly. Carlos squirmed out of Victoria's 
arms, ran to Gunderson, clutched his knee. 

"Daddy!" 


"But you said you liked classic films." 


Gunderson squatted, squared the boy's 
tiny shoulders. His son, he saw now, had the 
most chaotic green eyes he'd ever seen. 

"I love you, Carlito," Gunderson said, 
sniffed sharp diaper stink. The boy was long 
past due for potty training, and Gunderson 
wondered if it was his fault, all that trauma 
he'd visited upon his son's developmental 
years. "I think he needs to be changed." 

"Oh, yeah?” said Victoria. It was the old 
challenge. Gunderson knew in his heart he 
wasn't up to it. He wasn't squeamish, but 
he'd always preferred changing Carlos when 
it felt like something fun to do, a larkish 
deployment of diaper and wipe. So, here 
was the deal. He'd never be a good man, a 
stand-up guy, a pillar, his father. His absence 
would have to be a sort of honesty from 
which the boy could draw some strength. 
Besides, Gunderson was a prophet, à 
prophet on the clock, a very scary fucking 
clock. Didn't that count for something? 

"Oh, yeah," he said, walked out. 


High above the night city, he knew he'd 
done right. While the rock star worked 
the stick and hummed his old hit, "Snow 
Cap Sister," Gunderson looked out 
through the chopper's bubbled glass, got 
trippy on the lit grid below. His strife 
seemed so squalid up here in the heavens, 
and gazing down on the bright sick city 
stirred him. Maybe we were doomed fools 
on a dying biochemical fluke, but we'd 
had a damn good run. Sure, we'd mostly 
murdered, tortured, burned, but once in 
a while we'd made something beautiful. 
And we'd tried so hard to love. 

"Thus spake Hallmark," came a voice 
through his headset. "Cut the humanist 
rah-rah, friend." 

Gunderson hadn't even been aware he 
was talking out loud. He was embar- 
rassed the rock star had heard him get so 
sentimental, and he turned with what he 
hoped was a semidetached smile. 

"Will do, captain," said Gunderson. 

"So, what's on your mind tonight, 
buddy? You don't seem yourself. Not 
that I know what that is." 

"Do you really want to know what I'm 
thinking about?" said Gunderson. 

"Hell, no," said the rock star. “Just name 
the number. My pockets run deep." 

"You've mastered telepathy." 

"Something like that. Or maybe I can 
just tell that you need my help, and I 
believe in your message enough to want 
to give it. I'll write the check, you lead us 
back from the abyss." 

Gunderson smiled a true smile, felt a 
joyful melt in his belly. Screw Gerry, the 
television people. They had no part in 
this. What had to be done would be done 
by the secret society, his brethren in vision, 
this ludicrous geezer with the thousand- 
dollar T-shirt and spiked white hair. 


Gunderson turned to thank him, to tell him 
of the long march ahead and the beautiful 


PFLEAYEOT 


126 


bond they would forge, was a bit startled to 
see the rock star slumped in his straps, the 
stick starting to list. It was difficult to tell 
exactly when the spin had started or how 
fast the buildings were roaring up. The rock 
star was definitely dead. Maybe it was all the 
cocaine he'd been sneaking off to snort dur- 
ing dinner. Maybe it was everything he'd 
sniffed and jabbed and swallowed for the 
last 40 years. Rock stars made millions sing- 
ing about their broken hearts, and then 
their hearts actually exploded. This guy was 
going blue in his helmet. And he was not 
being a very good pilot. 

Gunderson closed his eyes, saw the 
strewn green of his son's. He felt strange 
pressings on his body, was a boy again him- 
self, waking slowly between his mother and 
his father on their flannel sheets in Eugene, 
a happy little boat bumping up on warm 
sloped isles. Pleasant, primal enough, this 
memory, suitable for the final reel, the clos- 
ing clip, but it somehow seemed unfair. 
Didn't he rate ultimate revelation, every 
artifice falling away, the cosmos unmasked 
and Gunderson in receipt of the supreme 
briefing via transcendental brain beam? 
He guessed not, for here rushed the roof- 
tops with their colossal vents, their trans- 
national signage, penthouses lush with 
light and hanging gardens. 

These last seemed to beckon him with 
pleasures he would never know again. 


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He'd been ready for the end of the world, 
but not the end of Gunderson. A plastic 
lie, this planet had become, but still, the 
beauty. There was Carlos, for starters. 
Carlos in sunshine too. Now Gunderson 
grew dizzy in his bubble tomb. He grieved. 
Death's smash and grab was upon him. 
He could feel a hand grip his arm, though 
it didn't seem to be the Reaper's. 

"Sorry about this," said Baltran. "Not 
what we were expecting, is itz" 


Light twirled in the gold weave of 


him. Somehow the shimmer steadied 
Gunderson. 

“So, it's bullshit? The calendar? The 
prophecy? Dimensional interface? You?" 

"No, it's not bullshit," said Baltran. "I 
mean, maybe. I don't know." 

"So, you're just a figment?” 

"Fuck you, figment." 

“You told me to do you proud." 

"You did me proud. I saw what you did." 

"And now what?" 

“I don't know, Maybe it still goes on." 

"Maybe it does," said Gunderson, felt 
his phone vibrate in his jacket. He took 
it out, read the blinking backlit message: 
Serious offer. Gerry. 

"Hey, shouldn't I be dead yet?" said 
Gunderson, looking over at Baltran. 
"This thing's been crashing for a while." 

"No, just seems that way. Here it 
comes, baby." 


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“I can feel it," whispered Gunderson. 
"I can taste it. It's coming on sweet.” 

“That must be your lozenge. There is 
no sweetness. What comes is pitiless, 
blind to you.” 

"Aren't we all connected?" 

"Yes, we are all connected," said Baltran, 
"but trust me, that's not really a good thing. 
For the record, I always liked you, Gunder- 
son. Adios, little buddy. Breathe easy now." 

Gunderson watched his friend's frame 
collapse into a sprinkly nimbus. 

"Connected how?" cried Gunderson. 
"To what?” But he knew what, had known 
for a while now, a few thousand years at 
least, back before his own shaman days on 
the shores of Oaxaca, longer, much lon- 
ger, back before his human days, back 
before his golden molting days, his wail- 
ing vapor days, back before anything you 
could call a day, when he was just another 
vector, another stray idea for being, dart- 
ing through great jagged reefs of anti- 
space. He'd known, but had he believed? 
Had he ever believed? Did it matter? 
Beyond the seal of this universe was a wet, 
blazing mouth. It slavered. It meant to 
munch. It had journeyed through many 
forevers to find what it existed to devour: 
the real-ass jumbo. 

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(continued from page 72) 
drive. An Italian neuroscientist, Dr. 
Donatella Marazziti, has documented 
other changes, such as the fact that in 
new lovers, the calming neurotransmitter 
serotonin drops to a level comparable to 
that in people who suffer from obsessive- 
compulsive disorder. More recently, 
Marazziti reported that 12 newly smitten 
men had lower levels of testosterone than 
a control group, while 12 newly smitten 
women had higher levels. Could it be, 
she asked, that nature brings us together 
by temporarily making men more like 
women and women more like men? 

Whatever its methods, nature intends 
only for you to breed; anything else you 
accomplish is gravy. To prevent you 
from coming to your senses after you 
have fallen for someone, the brain shuts 
down areas that process negative emo- 
tions, social judgment and “mentalizing,” 
or assessing other people's intentions 
and emotions. Love is blind—and also 
deaf, mute and retarded. You are juiced 
to a point at which you cannot rationally 
assess your lover's faults, which forces 
your friends and family to do it for you. 
The same chemical changes take place in 
the mind of another person whose par- 
ticipation is essential to the perpetuation 
of the species: a new mother. 

Some people so crave the dopamine rush 
of new love that they date anyone who will 
have them, jumping from one relationship 
to the next. Dr. Michael Liebowitz, author 
of The Chemistry of Love, has identified these 
types as "attraction junkies." He and a col- 
league found that some patients began to 
choose partners more carefully and feel 
more at ease being single after receiving 
antidepressants that boost the level of the 
brain neurotransmitter phenylethylamine, 
At the other extreme are people who 
claim never to have felt lust and/or attrac- 
tion. Although a true asexual has never 
been identified, scientists have found the 
rare male ram, rat or gerbil that shows no 
interest in mating, and one percent of the 
respondents in a survey of 18,000 adults 
claimed never to have felt sexual desire. 
Fisher believes there are people who form 
deep attachments but never fall in love, 
“Гуе met three people, including, most 
recently, a 76-year-old man, who did not 
experience the swirling, craving obsession 
of romantic love until late in life," she says. 
In recent years asexuals (a loosely defined 
group; some people say they feel lust but 
not infatuation or vice versa) have orga- 
nized online, arguing that asexuality, like 
homosexuality, should not be viewed as 
a disorder. On the bright side, if there is 
one, never falling in love prevents a great 
deal of heartache. 


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Brant, arnoldbrant.com 
and select Nordstrom 
stores. Boss Orange, 
hugoboss.com. Bottega 
Veneta, bottegaveneta 
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Brioni boutiques and 
Bergdorf Goodman. 
Bruno Grizzo, 212-563- 
0163. C'N'C, costume 
national.com. Dr. Martens 
for Yohji Yamamoto, avail- 
able at Yohji Yamamoto boutiques. 


buy the apparel and equipment 
shown on pages 30, 33-36, 76- 
80, 100-103 and 150-151, 
check the listings below to find 
the stores nearest you. 


GAMES 

Page 30: Conan, thq.com. 

Fury, ecocksucks.com. 

Guitar Hero III: Legends 

Rock, activision.com. H 

gate: London, ea.com. NBA '08, playstation 


com. Orange Box, ea.com. Pirates of the 
Burning Sea, soe.com, Star Wars Battle- 
front: Renegade Squadron, lucasarts 
com. Tabula Rasa, ncsoft.com. Tony Hawk's 
Proving Ground, activision.com. 
MANTRACK 

Pages 33-36: Bottega Veneta, bottega 
veneta.com. Frank Buchwald, frank 
buchwald.de. Jaeger- LeCoultre, jaeger- 
lecoultre.com. Logitech, logitech.com. 
Max Benjamin, max njamin.com. Olhau- 
sen Billiards, olhausenbilliards.com. Volks- 
wagen, vw.com. Wines, available at fine 
liquor stores nationwide. 


GENIUSES AT PLAY 

Pages 76-80: Assassin's Creed, ubisoft 
.com. Burnout Paradise, ea.com. Call of 
Duty 4: Modern Warfare, activision.com. 
Crysis, ca.com. God of War: Chains of Olym- 
pus, playstation.com. The Legend of Zelda: 
Phantom Hourglass, nintendo.com. Little 
Big Planet, playstation.com. Mass Effect, 
xbox.com. Mercenaries 2: World in Flames, 
ea.com. Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools 
Destruction, playstation.com. Rock В 
ea.com. Super Mario Galaxy, nintendo 
‚com. TimeShift, sierra.com. Uncharted: 
Drake's Fortune, playstation.com, Unreal 
Tournament Ш, midway.com. 


Dsquared, dsquared2.com. Ermenegildo 
Zegna, zegna.com. Etro, 310-248-2855. 
Fratelli Rossetti, fratellirossetti.com. 
Geox, geox.com. GF Ferré, www.gianfranco 
ferre.com. G Armani, 212-988-9191. 
Harrys of London, available at neiman 
marcus.com. Hublot, hublot.com. Hugo, 
hugoboss.com. Jee Vice, jeevice.com, 


John Varvatos, [анты сот. Just 


Cavalli, available at Macy's West. Malo, 
212-396-4721. Nicholas K., nicholask 
.com. Nicole Farhi, 212-223-8811. Prada, 
888-977-1900. Roberto Cavalli, roberto 
cavalli.com. Salvatore 800-628- 
8916. Seaward & Stearn of London, british 
apparel.com. Torino, available at Oak Hall 
in Memphis. Valentino, available at select 
Valentino boutiques. We Are Replay, 
888-REPLAYS. Yohji Yamamoto, yohji 
yamamoto.co.jp. 


POTPOURRI 

Pages 150-151: Cranium Wow, cranium 
com. GE, ge.com/phones. iRobot, irobot 
.com. PenAgain, penagain.com. Playboy 
Poker Camp, playboypokercamp.com. 
Shock Coffee, shockcoflee.com. Suck UK, 
suck.uk.com. The Sugar Plum Fairy Baking 
F Mine rack, 
thebeerbelly.com. 


CREDITS: PHOTOGRAPHY BY: Р, 3 PATTY BEAUDET-FRANGES, BRENNAN CAVANAUGH, OSAM 


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127 


LEE E BOF 


the day arnves when you sober up. When 
Marazziti took blood from 16 of her 24 
volunteers a year or two after they had 
reported being madly in love, their hor- 
mone levels had all returned to normal. 
The thrill was gone. This is for the best, 
Fisher says: “Many of us would die of sex- 
ual exhaustion if romantic love flourished 
endlessly." Coming down from the high 
doesn't necessarily mean you are no longer 
interested, just that your brain is making 
adjustments for the long haul. It produces 
less dopamine and more serotonin, replac- 
ing frenzy with calm. Oxytocin kicks in as 
a stabilizer. If one or both partners can't 
sustain their oxytocin level, the relationship 


sputters, although regular sex may help. “If 


you have enough orgasms with your part- 
ner, you may become 
more attached to 
her,” suggests Fisher, 
because climax 
appears to stimulate 
production of oxyto- 
cin and vasopressin, 
two hormones associ- 
ated with bonding. In 
animal studies, oxyto- 
cin has been found to 
encourage females to 
nurture their young 
and vasopressin to 
push males to defend 
the nest, 

But as anyone 
who didn't marry 
their middle-school 
girlfriend can tell 
you, things don't 
always work out. 
After examining the 
brain in love, Fisher 
and her colleagues 
repeated their 
fMRI experiment 
with volunteers who 
had recently been 
dumped. In fact, 
the day after her 
boyfriend ended 
their relationship, 
Fisher put herself 
into the machine, 
“I can't ask others 
to do it unless I'm 
willing," she says. As with her subjects, 
Fisher found a spike in her brain's dopa- 
mine activity—the same reaction we 
have when we first fall in love. When a 
reward is delayed, the brain churns out 
more dopamine. This explains why, in 
a phenomenon Fisher calls "frustration- 
attraction," adversity and barriers stoke 
the flames. We become obsessed with 
winning our lover back, agonize over 
what went wrong and, encouraged by 
Hollywood endings, make dramatic and 
ultimately humiliating appearances at 
their home or work to declare our love. 
During this initial protest phase many 
people become enraged, which may be 


128 the brain's way of helping us break away. 


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Fisher agrees with the assessment that 
the opposite of love is not hate but indif- 
ference, "Love and hate have too much 
in common," she says. "They involve 
similar focus and obsession." 

When we finally give up, we are left in 
despair. With time, our dopamine levels 
return to normal, helped along by novel 
activities, basking in sunlight and exer- 
cise. But an unfortunate few are unable to 
shake their depression. Terminally love- 
sick, they resort to suicide, a stunning act 
of destruction unique to Homo sapiens, 


BRaIn comes 

It's easy to imagine a group of neuro- 
scientists examining the first (MRI machines 
a decade ago in the same way pornogra- 


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began rolling supine college students head- 
first into the middle of the donut-shaped 
scanners and showing them erotica. Before 
fMRI, much of what scientists knew about 
the sexual brain came from studying epilep- 
tics who had reported an “orgasmic aura" 
before seizures and patients who for various 
reasons had electrodes implanted in their 
brain. In 1964 a physician reported that 
a patient given control over his electrode 
pressed the button constantly, saying it 
made him feel as if he were building up to 
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the doctor's other patients reported getting 
erections, and a fourth would bring up sex 
no matter what topic was being discussed. 
Lobotomies, lesions, tumors and hemor- 
rhages have led mild-mannered patients to 
masturbate openly or feel up the nurses. A 
75-year-old became "the man with a thou- 
sand hands," according to his wife. He 
declined to have a shunt in his brain repo- 
sitioned to stem his hypersexuality. 

The fMRI makes it easier to observe the 
brain in heat but presents its own chal- 
lenges. At Stanford, hospital officials refused 
to allow liquids (e.g., ejaculate) inside their 
expensive machine, so researchers could 
examine only arousal. Even if you can 
let volunteers reach climax, they must be 
able to do so without touching themselves, 
because masturba- 
tion activates the 
area of the brain 
that controls motor 
function and thus 
muddies the images. 
So far scienusts have 
located only women 
who are capable of 
this, although Alfred 
Kinsey estimated that 
three or four males 
in 5,000 possess the 
skill as well. Ideally, 
you would want to 
scan the brain and 
genitals at the same 
moment, to see how 
they interact, but the 
current technology 
can handle only so 
much excitement. 

If you don't know 
anyone who can 
climax by fantasy 
alone, the obvious 
alternative is to 
lend a hand. This 
is the Dutch way. 
In 2005 Gert Hol- 
stege, a professor 
of anatomy and 
embryology at the 
University of Gron- 
ingen, reported the 
results of a study in 
which he observed 
the brains of 11 men ages 19 to 45 as 
they received hand jobs from their girl- 
friends or wives while the men's heads 
were restrained with adhesive bands 
inside a positron emission tomography 
(PET) scanner. He repeated the experi- 
ment with 13 women. After studying the 
images, Holstege concluded that while 
the female brain appears to become lost 
in the moment during arousal and cli- 
max, the male brain remains engaged, 
anticipating the pleasure of being 
touched. It's hard to underestimate the 
importance of this aspect of male sexu- 
ality—studies suggest that a part of the 
brain known as the claustrum not only 
assists in creating fantasies but helps us 


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130 


jump into any erotic scenes we encoun- 
ter. Even when we aren't being touched, 
we can easily imagine the sensation, 

As a man becomes aroused, the amyg- 
dalae, two almond-shaped regions of the 
brain whose duties include keeping him 
constantly vigilant for hazards and threats, 
become much less active, just as they do 
when he is in the throes of new love, Hol- 
stege believes the DO NOT DISTURB sign 
goes up so that the male animal can con- 
centrate on the task at hand—reproduc- 
tion—without being distracted by every 
rustle in the brush. "Apparently a general 
lack of fear is necessary for ejaculation," 
he writes. Indeed, one study found that 
men watching porn showed a diminished 
startle response to a sudden burst of white 
noise. The time it took each man to punch 
the scientist remained constant, 


yOUR sexual CENTER 
Although many parts of the brain are 
involved in sexuality, the circuit board for 
our carnal desires appears to lie within the 
dime-size hypothalamus buried deep in the 
skull. As if processing your insatiable libido 
weren't enough, it also controls hunger, 
cardiovascular performance, body tem- 
perature, stress and emotional responses. 


"Imagine the hypothalamus as a row of 
dip switches," says biologist Simon LeVay. 
"They seem too tiny to be important but 
regulate everything." The precise source 
of the male drive appears to be located 
front and center, at a cowboy bar called the 
medial preoptic, where most of the brain 
neurons having androgen receptors are 
located, (The apparent center of the female 
sex drive, the ventromedial nucleus, is a 
few millimeters away.) When a male mon- 
key first sees a female in heat and presses 
a button to move toward her, the neurons 
in his medial preoptic go berserk. During 
intercourse the activity declines (no need 
for it while you're getting laid), and after 
ejaculation it falls again (mission accom- 
plished). When researchers damage the 
region, male monkeys lose most or all inter- 
est in females, though they will continue to 
masturbate. Something similar occurs in 
humans. In West Germany in the 1960s 
doctors destroyed the medial preoptics of a 
number of men whose sexual behavior was 
thought to be pathological or sociopathic. 
As LeVay reports in his book The Sexual 
Brain, the men experienced a severe loss 
of desire and had few if any fantasies. Con- 
versely, when a monkey's medial preoptic 
is stimulated with electricity, the otherwise 


"You know, this might be the start of a great American tradition.” 


suave simian gets so horny he offers the 
female only a few seconds of foreplay. The 
area may also be involved in sexual orienta- 
tion. In 1995 scientists at Boston University 
who mucked with it were able to change 
male ferrets from straight to gay. 

If the hypothalamus powers our carnal 
instincts, the amygdalae add a touch of 
humanity. Located on each side of the brain, 
these regions process emotional and visual 
stimuli. They are more than twice the size in 
humans as in apes, which may explain why 
we feel such intense emotions. A woman's 
amygdalae are more easily activated by what 
has been called emotional nuance, which is 
what gives your wife the ability even years 
later to recall vivid, pointless details of your 
first date. In men the amygdalae appear to 
be a way station for the male gaze. Although 
a 2006 study found the cortex of both gen- 
ders registers erotic scenes 20 percent faster 
than nonsexual ones (suggesting that some 
neurons may be "tuned" for sex), what the 
male and female brains do with this data is 
vastly different. When a man sees an image 
ofa couple having sex—or dancing or talk- 
ing, for that matter—his amygdalae (par- 
ticularly the left) and hypothalamus show 
far more activity than a woman's. We are 
not alone in our appreciation of the female 
form; male rhesus monkeys, given the 
choice of juice or a photo of a female mon- 
key ass, consistently choose the ass. Accord- 
ing to Stephan Hamann, a neuroscientist at 
Emory University, the amygdalae appear 
to control appetitive (desirous or wanting) 
but not consummatory (copulatory) sexual 
behaviors, That is, when the amygdalae are 
disabled in a male rat, he will still mount 
females placed directly beside him but show 
no desire to pursue. If he must go to the 
trouble of pushing a lever to have a randy 
female drop into his cage, forget it. 


FIRe aT WILL 
While examining the PET scans from 
his hand-job studies, Holstege, at the 
University of Groningen, was surprised 
to see that the hypothalamus, while con- 
stantly pushing you to procreate, doesn't 
make a peep when you are actually hav- 
ing sex—it drives you to the party but 
doesn't go inside. Thankfully, the hypo- 
thalamus does call ahead to make sure 
you have a good time. When you first 
get turned on, some of its neurons fire 
oxytocin down the spinal cord to alert 
other neurons in the pelvis. Oxytocin 
is a neurohormone, which means it can 
travel in the central nervous system as 
well as in the blood, allowing you to get 
hard that much quicker. (Some research- 
ers speculate that the more oxytocin 
deployed, the more intense the orgasm 
will be.) Once activated, nerves at the 
base of the spine send signals that relax 
the involuntary muscles around the tiny 
arteries in your penis, allowing blood to 
rush in. The blood presses against the 
veins running along the outside of the 
penis, keeping you hard. Other nerves 
instruct the perineum—the powerful 


muscle between your testicles and 
anus—to contract, pulling your erec- 
tion to full mast. When you are suffi- 
ciently aroused, the brain sends a signal 
to release the hounds. It is not clear how 
the brain knows the time has come for 
climax; suggestions that semen volume 
or pressure is the trigger have been 
largely discounted. 

The nature of the brain-penis rela- 
tionship can most easily be seen in men 
who have suffered spinal-cord injuries. 
Many paralyzed men are able to get 
hard and come, but they feel no plea- 
sure. The nerves at the base of the spine 
that control erection and ejaculation 
can still communicate with the penis 
but not the brain, so any erections that 
occur are simply reflexes. However, 
as researchers have only recently dis- 
covered, there may be a bypass to the 
spinal cord's sensory highway. By 1990 
scientists had established that a pair of 
primitive nerves known as the vagus 
(“wandering”), which meanders from 
the base of the brain and around the 
heart, lungs, stomach, liver and intes- 
tines and regulates vital functions such 
as breathing and swallowing, reaches 
past the abdomen into the pelvis. Then, 
in 2004, Beverly Whipple and Barry 
Komisaruk of Rutgers announced they 
had documented sexual impulses being 
sent along the route. They had placed 
women paralyzed from the waist down 
into an fMRI and asked them to mastur- 
bate even though they couldn't feel their 
fingers on their clits. "One woman with 
a completely severed spinal cord had six 
orgasms," recalls Whipple, whose most 
recent book is The Science of Orgasm, 
written with Komisaruk and biologist 
Carlos Beyer-Flores. "Our scans found 
her brain was reacting to the stimulation 
in the same way as people who aren't 
paralyzed. How do you explain this? 
Imagery lights up a different part of 
the brain, so she wasn't imagining it." 
After injecting the woman with a tracer, 
Whipple and Komisaruk followed the 
impulses along the vagus. Komisaruk 
hopes to begin a similar experiment 
with men next year. He suspects the 
vagus connects the brain to the prostate, 
meaning volunteers should be able to 
climax by stimulating the gland. 

The ability of some women and per- 
haps some men to get sexual pleasure 
from the rhythmic stimulation of an 
area just above the level of their injury, 
e.g., the chest, shoulder or chin, reveals 
us to be total erotic beings. Although 
it's far easier to climax by stroking the 
genitals, caressing any part of the body 
apparently can "recruit" neurons in the 
brain to become more and more active, 
until, as with a sneeze or a yawn, there 
is a sudden release of tension—a gasp, 
perhaps, then calm. For the moment, 
everything is right with the world. 


ICEMAN 


(continued from page 106) 
who appear to be polar opposites in per- 
sonality, often seem similar because of 
these qualities. I grasp that what the fight- 
ers have become through training and 
fighting is more significant than why they 
once fought. Whether they were overly 
belligerent or tough, levelheaded kids, 
now they fight because they love competi- 
tion. They're not ridding themselves of 
aggression or ironing out some childhood 
complex; they're having fun. I learn that 
Liddell, while growing up in Santa Bar- 
bara, was bullied in grammar school, 
which led him to study martial arts at the 
age of 12. But this no longer seems ger- 
mane to the man he is today. “I’ve got the 
greatest fighter in the world," Hackleman 
says of Liddell. "And he's the same now as 
when he used to sleep on my sofa and get 
$30 for fights in Bakersfield." 

Thirty dollars? Who fights for $30? 
"They were amateur fights," Hackleman 
says. "Sometimes the promoter would 
float you gas money. Chuck always 
insisted on giving the money to me." 

The ring in which Liddell first fought 
Hackleman is above the house, on a hill, 
but today the workout is held in a cage, 
a scaled-down Octagon that has been 
roofed against the weather and set below 
the house, partway down a steep, thicketed 
defile. Affixed to one of the support posts 
are metal letters spelling out THE PIT. 

Suddenly I'm surrounded by fighters. 
They seem to come out of the woods, 
out of nowhere. It's as if Hackleman 


were running a camp for extremely fit 
Lost Boys. They sit outside the cage, talk- 
ing, wrapping their hands, putting on 
shin guards and headgear. That accom- 
plished, they begin to jog, making tight 
little circuits around the cage. Up above, 
by the side of the driveway, Von Flue and 
another fighter, Luke Riddering, swing 
those 20-pound hammers against huge 
tires from semis, a strengthening exer- 
cise during which they grow red-faced. 
Someone switches on a boom box and 
"Bad to the Bone" and "Who Do You 
Love?" pour over the hillside. 

With about a dozen fighters inside, the 
cage is nearly full. They pair off accord- 
ing to Hackleman's dictates and begin 
to spar, both boxing and grappling. 
He stands outside the cage, snapping 
instructions: "Fast hands! Leg checks!" 
But he keeps things light and jokes with 
the fighters. When one makes a misstep, 
Hackleman shouts happily that anyone 
who makes the same mistake should be 
"beaten, shot and sodomized." Later, 
when Scott Lighty, an up-and-coming 
fighter and Liddell's sparring partner for 
the past nine years, goofs up, Hackleman 
says he deserves to be "keistered." 

Is this Logos, I wonder, or pathos? 

The gimpiness Liddell displayed earlier 
disappears. He seems back in his element, 
sliding across the mat, winging punches, 
doing what his body was designed to do. 
Von Flue and Riddering stop their ham- 
mering and come down to the cage to 
work the heavy bags. It's violent activity, 
but because it’s so controlled a peaceful 
air settles over the defile. The cool blue 


“Гт so glad that you enjoyed our little dinner and that 
you didn't taste the poison!" 


131 


PLAYBOY 


California afternoon surrounds the cage; 
noises of exertion blend with the sounds 
of the wind and a dog barking in the dis- 
tance. The fighters' attitudes acquire a 
ritual formality. You can feel the organic 
principle of the place, the thing it has 
become as a result of hard work and train- 
ing. If I were to let my concentration slip 
a little, it would be easy to imagine the 
cage is full of Shaolin novices and all this 
is happening a long time ago. 


San Luis Obispo, with a population of 
45,000 and its laid-back California open- 
ness and style, may be the geographic 
incarnation of Liddell. He came here 
nearly 20 years ago to attend nearby 
Cal Poly, where he earned a degree in 
accounting and was a four-year starter 
on the wrestling team. Though he now 
drives a Hummer and a Ferrari F430 
Spider, both gifts from the UFC, he says 
one thing he liked about the town was 
he could walk everywhere he had to go. 
As I stroll through the compact business 
district, I see Liddell's picture in a store 
window. He's holding a can of Xyience, a 
nutritional supplement for which he has 
a lucrative endorsement contract. The 
window of a hair salon contains a pho- 
tograph not of Liddell but of someone 
else wearing his signature Mohawk. In 
Mother's Tavern, a mahogany-paneled 
bar with ceiling fans, the patrons are 
happy to talk about Liddell and say good 
things. I don't meet anyone who holds a 
negative opinion of him. 

Over steak and pasta that evening at 
the Mission Grill, an upscale bar and 
restaurant in downtown SLO, Liddell 
and a few friends, including Antonio 
Banuelos, his personal assistant, plan a 
cruise to Baja. Banuelos, his arms cov- 
ered in tattoos, an ace of spades con- 
spicuous on one wrist, is also a fighter, 
a bantamweight in World Extreme 
Cagefighting, another organization, 
like Pride, that the UFC has absorbed. 

Not long ago Floyd Mayweather Jr., 
the welterweight boxing champion, made 
disparaging remarks about the UFC. 
Liddell responded that he had a 135- 
pounder living in his house who would 
kick Mayweather's ass. Banuelos is that 
135-pounder. He talks about his approach 
to an upcoming fight, but Liddell's next 
fight, with Keith Jardine, is not discussed 
except as a date after which Liddell will be 
available for the cruise. Though he enjoys 
being around fighters, Liddell tries to 
keep his personal life separate from train- 
ing and UFC business. 

"Fighüng's my job," he says. “I train 
hard, and I fight hard. People come up 
to me all the time and want to talk about 
fighting. I just tell them, I'm off now, 
you know.’ They usually get it." 

He gives me a mild yet meaningful 
look. I get it. The talk turns to a wed- 
ding they all attended. Liddell usually 


132 seems relaxed, even when he fights, but 


here, laughing with friends, a boyishness 
that is suppressed in other places comes 
out. He leans forward, eager to get in his 
licks as the group good-naturedly busts 
an absent friend's balls. 

I sneak in a question about his budding 
acting career. Recently he played himself on 
an episode of Entourage, one of his favor- 
ite TV shows. Brad Marks told me Liddell 
was being considered for a role in the sequel 
to The Punisher, among other movies. 

“Гуе had lots of meetings with studio 
people," Liddell says. "They've offered 
stuff, like a part in Wanted, but we're hav- 
ing trouble coordinating our schedules." 

There is a downside to all this celeb- 
rity. He tells me about an encounter with 
Paris Hilton at a Vegas club. 

“It was back when I was dating Willa 
Ford," he says. "Just after I started dating 
her, we were at a roped-off table, and Paris 
started dancing close to us, hanging her 
ass over the rope. She was dating one of 
Willa's old boyfriends, and she was getting 
in Willa's face about it. So I went and talked 
to her security guy, and he said, ‘What can 
I do? She's got a mind of her own. 

**Coulda fooled me,’ I said." 


“ 


ош we have six- and seven- 
year-old kids training in 
MMA,” says Liddell. 
"They're going to be monsters. 
They'll do amazing things. 
I'm glad ГИ be retired." 


Liddell chuckles and says, "Anyway, 
she kept on doing it. Willa was getting 
mad. She was ready to beat the hell out 
of Paris. So I talked to the guy again. I 
told him if Willa goes at Paris, I know he's 
going to have to put his hands on her. 
Once that happens, it's on! We had other 
fighters at our table, like Matt Hughes 
and Tim Sylvia. I pointed to them and 
said, ‘If I get involved, my friends are 
going to get involved.' He called in the 
club's security. They know me; they knew 
I wasn't the one causing problems." 

What happened? 

"We left," says Liddell. "It wasn't 
worth the trouble. A month or two later 
I was at the Playboy Mansion and Paris 
came up to me, trying to.... I don't 
know what she was after, but I told her 
to go fuck herself. Eventually Willa and 
Paris made up. It worked itself out." 
He makes an amused noise and says, 
"Shit like that usually does." 


Being in a room with a group of men 
who can kick your ass as easily as they 
might swat a mosquito is inspiring and 


daunting. You promise yourself you'll 
get in shape, maybe start running again, 
dig that old weight set out of the garage, 
check into personal trainers—and then 
you realize the day when you could 
get into the kind of shape these men 
are in has long since passed. The only 
six-pack you've been building is the 
pyramid of empties on the coffee table. 
You try to think of ways in which you 
might compete with them: vocabulary 
tests, the home Jeopardy! game, thumb 
wrestling. No, wait—thumb wrestling 
has too much risk of injury. You'd be 
much more comfortable with rock- 
paper-scissors. Then you realize there's 
no need for such agita, because no one 
here is competing with you. 

The room is the gym area of SLO 
Kickboxing, a martial-arts school 
owned by Liddell and his partner, Scott 
Adams. It's a wide, clean space domi- 
nated by a boxing ring and an open 
area covered with a blue wrestling 
mat, one wall lined with heavy bags. 
In the corridor leading to the gym is 
a bulletin board hung with some old 
newspaper clippings of Liddell's ac- 
complishments, but they're lost among 
fliers for local events and an upcom- 
ing fight in San Jose. There are no Ice- 
man T-shirts, posters or coffee cups. 
This differs from boxing gyms that are 
homes to well-known fighters, where a 
fighter's prominence is trumpeted and 
used as a publicity tool to benefit the 
other boxers, One thing I've learned 
about Liddell is that he wants to keep 
fame in perspective. 

“It’s all about the 30 or 40 people clos- 
est to you," he says. "The rest of it... Не 
makes a dismissive gesture. 

A youth class has just ended when 
we arrive for Liddell's evening training 
session. (He trains twice a day, six days 
a week, and runs in the mornings.) As 
students empty into the corridor, Lid- 
dell warms up alone on the mat, and 
a solitary blond kid, maybe 14 or 15, 
works off to the side, slamming leg 
kicks into a heavy bag as if it's stand- 
ing in for his worst enemy, concentrat- 
ing on his technique and never once 
looking at Liddell. It's a perfect rep- 
resentation of the sport's continuity: I 
can envision the young Liddell training 
with such intensity. 

That afternoon Liddell climbed 
into the boxing ring, where five spar- 
ring partners were lined up along 
the ropes, waiting. They came at him 
one after another, each fighting for 
a minute or so before switching off, 
not allowing him a break. Tonight the 
focus is on grappling, but the pattern 
is the same. Initially Liddell defends 
against takedowns, rebuffing his spar- 
ring partners as they shoot in on a leg, 
tossing them aside or forcing them to 
release his legs by bringing them up 
into a clinch. They start out at half 
speed, bantering, cuffing one another 


PLAYBOY 


134 


like young bears at play, but soon you 
hear the impact ofbodies and feet slid- 
ing over the mat. After this Liddell lies 
down, lets one of them secure a hold 
and tries to stand up. The fighters do 
their best to keep him down, but he 
manages to stand each time. 


In sunbaked San Luis Obispo the house 
closest to the sun belongs to Liddell. It's 
high on a hill, a California ranch-style 
affair with glass doors in the back that open 
onto a large multilevel patio featuring a 
hot tub, a bar, a pool and—twisting down 
over huge boulders piled to form a wall—a 
waterslide, which Liddell says is great for 
his kids, Cade (who lives with his mom in 
Colorado) and Trista, eight and nine and 
a half years old, respectively. There's a nice 
informality to the atmosphere. Banuelos 
pads about in shorts and flip-flops, seeing 
to various household chores. Liddell's girl- 
friend, Erin Wilson, an attractive blonde, 
shows up while Liddell is in the kitchen, 
grousing about the strawberries in his 
takeout sushi and wondering why they 
mixed fruit in with the seafood. Trista can 
be heard talking upstairs. A black Chihua- 
hua named Bean bounces from a sofa to 
the floor and back. 

Trista and Liddell go down the water- 
slide together a few times, making big 


splashes. As they play in the pool, I see 
that, perhaps unconsciously, he's prac- 
ticing his footwork: stepping, sliding off, 
turning. Afterward he and Trista walk 
up to the hot tub, set on an elevated 
level of the patio amid an outcropping 
of boulders. Liddell soaks in the warm 
water, and while Trista darts back and 
forth between house and patio, he brags 
about her, saying she kicks his ass when 
they play fighting games on her Nin- 
tendo Wii. Trista returns with a pool 
toy, an enormous inflatable lobster she 
wants blown up. Liddell complies, and 
between stints of puffing he talks about 
the future of his sport. 

"Most of the fighters in the UFC 
have a background in one discipline— 
wrestling, Muay Thai or jujitsu. Now 
we have six- and seven-year-old kids 
training in MMA. They're going to be 
monsters. They'll do amazing things. 
I'm glad ГИ be retired." 

How much longer does he plan to 
fight? 

"As long as my body holds up," he says. 
"I've got tendinitis in both shoulders and 
bursitis in both knees. I have to ice down 
my knees and shoulders——" 

"Four times a day," says Trista, not 
wanting to be left out of the conversa- 
tion. Then she dashes off again into 
the house. 


“Just a condom, Moose. The cup is overkill.” 


Holding a thumb over the valve, 
Liddell takes a break from inflating 
the lobster and describes a visit to a 
veterans hospital. He's in awe of the 
soldiers and doesn't understand how 
they keep doing what they do. I sug- 
gest it relates to the bond forged 
between brothers in arms. 

"Yeah," he says. “They all talked about 
how they couldn't wait to get back to 
their buddies." 

Trista's back. She's growing impatient. 
The lobster is still about 95 percent 
deflated, bacon-red and flat, stretched 
out across the surface of the hot tub like 
a waterlogged piece of roadkill. After 
another few minutes of blowing into the 
valve, Liddell says, "Daddy's getting a 
little light-headed." He tells Trista to ask 
Banuelos to help. 

He settles into the tub, easing his bones 
and squinting against the strong sun. The 
image I have is of a lion at rest, kicked 
back in a patch of tall grass, scars on his 
flanks, a cub chewing on his ear, content 
to let others take care of the day-to-day 
business of survival. But when needed 
he'll be ready to deal with the situation, 

I ask if he has to work up hatred for 
the fighters he's matched against. 

"Emotion clouds your judgment," he 
says. "I've disliked only two fighters— 
Vernon White and Tito Ortiz—but I 
didn't let that get in the way." 

His enmity with Ortiz dates from 
2002, when Ortiz was the UFC light- 
heavyweight champ and Liddell was 
the number one contender. Ortiz gave 
excuse after excuse for not fighting 
him, and the rift has widened since 
then. Liddell's not eager to talk about 
Ortiz, whom he subsequently knocked 
out twice, but he does mention that he 
tore a medial collateral ligament before 
fighting Ortiz the second time. 

“The doctors told me it was stable and 
I couldn't hurt it any worse," Liddell says. 
"As long as I could handle the pain, they 
told me to go ahead with the fight." 

"Didn't it hamper your movement?" 
I ask. 

"Yeah, but I'm a confident fighter," he 
says. "I know I've got the power to fin- 
ish a fight, even in the last minute of the 
last round." 

We discuss the importance of confi- 
dence, and he says, "Quinton Jackson 
came to me after he'd had a couple of 
losses. He'd lost confidence and asked 
me what to do. I told him to watch some 
videotape and see what he was doing dif- 
ferently." He chops the water lightly with 
the edge of his hand. 

“I like Quinton," he says. "He's a nice 
guy, a very funny guy." He looks at me 
flatly, coolly, the look I've seen on his face 
when he fights, the Iceman surfacing 
from beneath his friendly manner. 

"That doesn't mean I'm not going to 
try and tear his head off," he adds. 


PLAYBOY 


WOLFOWITZ (continued from page 62) 


“ 


what even a skeptical employee had 
described as a "collegial" relationship 
with the bank's staff. Now the Chad in- 
cident awakened all the latent discom- 
fort the bankers harbored about one of 
the primary authors of the war in Iraq, 
and it gave Wolfowitz's most dogged 
internal enemies their first opportunity 
to brand him an unreconstructed Bush- 
style unilateralist. 

Speaking after his ouster, Wolfowitz 
seemed ready to admit the Chad episode 
had damaged his standing. "Maybe some 
members of the [bank's executive] board 
felt they were inadequately consulted," he 
said. "Yes, I may have, you know, maybe 
I took it on, they would probably say, in 
too confrontational a way." Most strik- 
ing about these remarks is their miserli- 
ness with the currency of remorse. What 
begins as Wolfowitz's qualified attempt 
at self-examination ("Yes, I may have, 
you know, maybe I took it on") quickly 
morphs into an exercise in dispassionate 
and thus wholly unapologetic reportage 
of his critics’ views ("they would probably 
say, in ‘too confrontational a way" "). 

In the battle over his image, Wol- 
fowitz was ill equipped to compete. "He 
was nerdy, like the geeky boy in high 
school," said one bank staffer. "He had 
trouble looking you in the eye," an asso- 
ciate said, and was prone, when kidded, 
to "chuckle in a nervous way." "I could 
see," said a female subordinate, "how 
he would respond to a strong-minded 
woman who'd wear the pants." 

Which brings us to Shaha Riza. Born 
in Tripoli and raised in Saudi Arabia, 
Riza studied international relations at 
Oxford. She joined the bank in 1997 
and rose through its ranks despite an 
aggressive personality that endeared her 
to feminist fellow travelers but often left 
others—especially American men—cold. 
"I'm a Muslim Arab woman who dares 
to question the status quo," she once 
proudly declared, "both in the work of 
the World Bank and within the institu- 
tion itself." For this she was rewarded, she 
believed, with “open hostility against me 
by at least one member of the board of 
directors." Xavier Coll testified that Riza 
"felt the institution owed her because she 
had been mistreated and discriminated 
against by her managers." 

A female staffer who worked along- 
side Riza in Washington and the Mid- 
dle East recalled her as “not a talker, 
very quiet," someone who would speak 
up only at the end of meetings, but 
also as “a bit of a ballbuster. She wasn't 
someone to be messed with. She was a 


136 strong woman. Men didn't get along 


e was nerdy, like the geeky boy in high school," said 
one staffer. "He had trouble looking you in the eye." 


with her. Feminists loved her." The 
few published photographs of Riza 
show a middle-aged woman with dyed 
blondish-amber hair and pronounced 
rings beneath kindly eyes. 

Wolfowitz and Riza, in short, were 
hardly Brangelina, but they had each 
other. And as they prepared for Wol- 
fowitz to assume the World Bank presi- 
dency, a position that carries a five-year 
term and may be renewed by the bank's 
executive board, they likely envisioned 
themselves spending the next decade 
working together—individually but 
under the same roof—to advance the 
passionately pro-democracy agenda 
that bound their love. 


Up ull then the romance between Wol- 
fowitz, a New York Jew, and Riza, the 
child of a Libyan father and Syrian-Saudi 
mother, was one of Washington's open 
secrets, "Wolfowitz regularly spends the 
night at Riza's home," The Washington 
Post's gossip column, The Reliable Source, 
reported in March 2005, when he was 
still the number two official in Rumsfeld's 
Pentagon. "Wolfowitz's guards wait in a 
car outside until he departs early in the 
morning." A neighbor chortled, "I don't 
know if it could be more public if it were 
on 16th and K streets." Separated from 
Clare, his wife of 30 years, Wolfowitz 
spoke of divorce, but it remains unclear 
whether the split was ever finalized. 
Also taking note of the relationship 
were Wolfowitz's Bush administration 
colleagues. Shortly after the Iraq war 
began, Wolfowitz arranged to have Riza 
appointed as a "subject-matter expert," 
or consultant, to a special Pentagon office. 
She provided analysis on her policy spe- 
cialty, the empowerment of women in 
Muslim societies, to the Office of Recon- 
struction and Humanitarian Assistance, 
or ORHA, the Pentagon's first stab at a 
U.S.-led post-Saddam Iraqi government 
(succeeded by the better-known Coalition 
Provisional Authority, or CPA). In the 
dangerous month of April 2003 Riza took 
an unpaid leave from the bank to visit 
Baghdad, where she discussed with Iraqi 
women's groups how they could enlarge 
their role in the country's reformation. 
Fluent in Arabic and four other lan- 
guages and immersed for the past two 
decades in the wonky minutiae of global 
development issues, Riza was unques- 
tionably qualified for the assignment. 
Sull, Defense Department auditors, their 
memories triggered by the Reliable Source 
item, quietly launched an investigation to 
determine whether Wolfowitz, in choosing 


her for the job, had "used his public office 
for [Riza's] private gain." Though they ulti- 
mately answered that question in the nega- 
tive, the probe turned up a series of e-mails 
indicating that the contracts for Riza and 
the other consultants were issued "with- 
out full and open competition" and that 
Wolfowitz himself "may have exerted pres- 
sure on subordinates to bring [Riza] under 
contract on an expedited basis." "The 
E-Ring”—the Pentagon corridor housing 
the military's most senior officials, includ- 
ing Wolfowitz at the time is screaming to 
bring [the consultants] on now,” read one 
e-mail. "Wolfowitz has taken a personal 
interest in getting this team together," read 
another. “[Name redacted] gets daily calls 
from Larry DiRita [a top Rumsfeld aide]... 
If we don't act soon, we will have lost the 
confidence of the E-Ring." 

Questioned under oath about the 
episode by Pentagon investigators, Wol- 
fowitz claimed he couldn't remember 
whether he recommended Riza for the 
consultancy—but that if he had, it would 
have been because of her qualifications, 
not their personal relationship. A sepa- 
rate investigation, focused more broadly 
on Pentagon contracting in Iraq, also 
looked at Riza's consultancy and con- 
cluded that officials at ORHA, scrambling 
to compose the criteria for her position 
after her selection for it, "neither fol- 
lowed nor tried to learn the acquisition 
process." "These are the people we need 
to bring on board," one official was told, 
"and make the rest of it happen." 

Wolfowitz attributed these departures 
from standard operating procedure to 
an urgent need for the highly special- 
ized skills of the consultants, including 
Riza. Yet the deputy secretary—integrally 
involved in the conception and execution 
of the Iraq war and unapologetic about it 
to this day—also offered a rare and previ- 
ously unpublished admission of the Bush 
administration's deficiencies in planning 
for and presiding over postwar Iraq. "We 
got to Baghdad much faster than people 
anticipated," Wolfowitz testified, adding, 
"We were already starting to have large 
meetings of Iraqis debating the consti- 
tutional principles of the country, and 
we had no political team there to advise 
[ORHA head] Jay Garner and later [CPA 
chief L. Paul] Bremer on how to do it." 


Here was Wolfowitz admitting the Bush 
administration had failed to send any 
Americans to help the Iraqis draft a new 
constitution even as late as May 12, 2003, 
the date Bremer took over as head of CPA. 
This was 11 days after the president's "mis- 
sion accomplished" appearance on the deck 
of the USS Abraham Lincoln and almost five 
weeks after the fall of Baghdad. 

Nor is the ORHA episode unique in 
offering an insight into how the personal 
relationship between Wolfowitz and Riza 
intersected with their professional lives. 
A high-ranking State Department official 


remembered the couple's relationship 
intruding on another national security 
initiative: Libyan strongman Muammar 
al-Qaddafi's historic secret agreement 
to disclose and dismantle all his coun- 
try's weapons of mass destruction and 
ballistic-missile programs in exchange 
for the restoration of diplomatic ties with 
the United States. 

Announced in December 2003, the 
Libyan deal represented one of the 
most sensitive and significant projects of 
the first Bush term. Senior administra- 
tion officials repeatedly cited the inva- 
sion of Iraq, then just nine months old, 
as a prime factor in Qaddafi's change 
of heart. During his first debate with 
Senator John Kerry, at the University of 
Miami in September 2004, Bush boasted 
about the war's effects, "By speaking 
clearly and sending messages that we 
mean what we say," Bush said, "we've 
affected the world in a positive way. Look 
at Libya. Libya was a threat. Libya is now 
peacefully dismantling its weapons pro- 
grams. Libya understood that America 
and others will enforce doctrine, and the 
world is better for it." 

Yet this momentous initiative was 
almost torpedoed by the Wolfowitz-Riza 
romance, "When we were doing Libya," 
the State Department official recalled, 
“we kept on running into all this resis- 
tance at OSD [Office of the Secretary of 
Defense], and I kept wondering, What's 
the problem over there? Finally someone 
told me, 'It's Wolfowitz. He has a Libyan 
American girlfriend who hates Qaddafi.’ 
And Wolfowitz was adamant that there'd 
be no deal until Qaddafi was dead." 


Wolfowitz knew he would not be greeted 
in the World Bank as, well, a liberator. 
"Dr. Wolfowitz told us," the Pentagon 
investigators wrote in April 2005, that 
"strong opposition to the war was preva- 
lent within the World Bank." New to the 
institution’s polished, Eurocentric culture 
and eager to establish his credibility with 
the bank's largely foreign, overwhelm- 
ingly anti-Bush management class, Wol- 
fowitz strove to play by the rules. 

He had his attorney, Bob Barnett of 
Williams & Connolly, notify bank leaders 
that the incoming president and Riza 
had had, in the decidedly unromantic 
parlance of the HR world, a “preexisting 
relationship." Unwilling to sign a contract 
until the potential conflict was resolved, 
Wolfowitz suggested through Barnett 
that the bank's ethics committee guide 
the parties’ actions. The bank agreed, 
and soon its general counsel, Roberto 
Dañino, a jowly, white-haired Peruvian, 
sent Barnett an e-mail saying, "We will 
arrange for the ethics committee to deal 
with this matter as soon as possible." 

Wolfowitz proposed a solution of recu- 
sal, some formal agreement to limit his 
professional dealings with his girlfriend 
(or companion, as Riza preferred to be 


called). When Danino sought to clarify 
whether Wolfowitz had proposed sever- 
ing himself "from all personnel matters 
and professional contact related to" Riza, 
Barnett e-mailed back that Wolfowitz's 
remedy "WOULD NOT—I REPEAT, 
NOT—INVOLVE RECUSAL FROM 
PROFESSIONAL CONTACT." The 
next day, having disabled his cars Lock 
key, Barnett e-mailed Danino to explain 
that the president-elect intended only to 
recuse himself from "personnel actions 
or decisions" concerning Riza, a formu- 
lation that enabled the two to maintain 
contact at the World Bank. 

In staking out this position, Wolfowitz 
was likely envisioning a relationship simi- 
lar to the one Riza had had with the bank's 
previous president, James Wolfensohn; 
separated by multiple levels of bureaucracy, 
the two had interacted only "a handful of 
times," Riza later testified. More impor- 
tant, Wolfowitz was likely signaling to the 
executive board that he and Riza knew 
all about certain other "situations" at the 
bank. Two women had been permitted to 
continue working there while their hus- 
bands served in senior management posi- 
tions. As managing director, Shengman 
Zhang was Wolfensohn's number two 
man, overseeing worldwide operations for 
five years. Zhang's wife, Lingzhi Xu, who 
began her World Bank career as a D-grade 
procurement assistant earning an annual 
salary in the range of $52,000, received a 
series of impressive promotions and ulti- 
mately secured a senior specialist position 
with an average annual salary of $123,000. 
Danino later admitted that Xu "ended up 
being in the same unit Zhang was head- 
ing." The conflict ended only when Zhang 
left for Citigroup. A bank employee later 
told The Wall Street Journal that Xu's ascent 
was fraught with "question marks." 

Then there was Maritta R. von Bieber- 
stein Koch-Weser, an anthropologist who 
held several management positions at 
the bank, including the (characteristically 
pithy) title of "director for environmentally 
and socially sustainable development for 
the Latin America and Caribbean region." 
Meanwhile, her husband, Caio Koch-Weser, 
a handsome German economist— John 
Forsythe in banker's pinstripes—enjoyed 
а 26-уеаг career at the bank, which cata- 
pulted him, too, to the level of managing 
director. "Neither wife was asked to leave 
the institution," Riza later testified. "If 
[either Zhang or Koch-Weser] was the sole 
managing director and he had no conflict 
of interest, why would I have any conflict 
of interest?... 1 was wondering, maybe 
because they're married, [the ethics com- 
mittee members] are seeing that their 
relationships are asexual. But because I'm 
dating, there must be sex there.” 

For that argument Dañino had a ready 
retort. In the World Bank's dreary Ham- 
murabic code of professional conduct, Staff 
Rule 3.01 stipulates that "a sexual relation- 
ship between a staff member and his/her 


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direct report or direct or indirect manager 
or supervisor is considered a de facto con- 
flict of interest.” Coll and the bank's HR 
mandarins considered Wolfowitz, as presi- 
dent, to possess "a reporting line to any- 
body in the institution." Conversely, Staff 
Rule 4.01 sets forth the byzantine though 
theoretically practicable circumstances 
under which spouses may carry on work- 
ing relationships. 

The bank stood on shakier ground in the 
question of whether the Zhang and Koch- 
Weser cases would look bad in the event 
Riza sued the bank. All parties dryly termed 
this extreme fear of adverse publiaty the 
bank's "reputational risk." The phrase 
recurred throughout the Wolfowitz-Riza 
case, an invisible MacGuffin and spoken 
mantra, shorthand for . "There 
was reputational risk of this blowing up," 
an employee testified, "and us looking like 
we treated women like chattel.” Dañino 
judged Riza's chances of prevailing at trial 
"very remote," but he too acknowledged 
the "implicit reputational risk" the case 
posed and that he was "constantly aware" 
of it. Coll privately assessed the bank's 
legal jeopardy, solved for the elusive X of 
reputational risk, with far less sanguinity. 
"We are in a very difficult situation—with 
no precedents at the bank—and it has 
enormous potential to damage the bank's 
reputation," the HR vice president wrote 
in an August 2005 memo, adding "there is 
a great risk to the bank if we cannot come 
to a workable agreement in a few days." 

A Riza v. World Bank lawsuit had begun 
to loom as a real prospect the month be- 
fore, when ethics committee chairman Ad 
Melkert, a Dutch Labor Party politician— 
another in the bank's seemingly endless 
supply of balding white men in stylish 
European eyeglasses—icily informed Wol- 
fowitz that "the ethics committee does not 
consider recusal sufficient." Moreover, 
Melkert said, the ethics committee "advises 
[Riza] be relocated to a position beyond 
(potential) supervising influence by the 
president meaning out of the bank alto- 
gether, with the banishment to last the du- 
ration of Wolfowitz's tenure. 

For Riza, the "ballbuster" whose 
chief sin was to have fallen in love with 
Paul Wolfowitz, the options were sud- 
denly cruelly limited to three choices: 
immediate termination with or without 
compensation, nasty litigation or "sec- 
ondment," a transfer to an equivalent 
job, with equivalent benefits, at a place 
like the State Department. "I felt under 
attack," Riza testified. "I was 51 years old 
and being asked to remove myself from a 
career path to employment limbo for five 
if not 10 years. Why should I resign just 
because he became president? This is my 
world. This is my life." 

At a farewell party for Wolfensohn, 
Riza ambushed Coll and unleashed a 
torrent of indignation and threatening 
allusions to workplace unpleasantness, 
adverse publicity and litigation—repu- 
tational risk in all its monstrous, Hydra- 


headed forms. “I told him that this is 
absolutely unacceptable," she later testi- 
fied. “*I'm not going to leave this place, 
and there is nothing that you can do 
about it.... If you think Гм not going 
to take this all the way up just because 
you have Paul Wolfowitz as president, 
you must be joking, because I'm going 
to relish it even more if he's there.“ 

"She was extremely unpleasant," an 
employee recalled. 

Thus the stage was set for the rocky 
meeting in Riza's office, where she and 
Coll, according to Riza's testimony, both 
forswore the desire to "fuck" each other. 
Coll attempted to explain—"I suppose to 
give me a sweet," Riza said—that in view 
of the disruption to her career, her com- 
pensation would include immediate pro- 
motion to H level. But Riza, as an acting 
manager, was already short-listed for an H. 
Coll tried to sound conciliatory ("We need 
to be discussing this further"); Riza did 
not (“I will be coming in with my lawyer"). 
The two had another bruising encounter 
three days later, on August 11. Coll coolly 
opened with a lump-sum offer. Riza, who 
acknowledged growing "emotional at 
parts" of their talk, angrily demanded 
automatic I and J promotions. 

Riza's testimony about this meeting 
exposed the emotional strain the contro- 
versy was inflicting on her, as well as the 
heavy toll it was taking on her relationship 
with Wolfowitz: She was disgusted that he 
did nothing to oppose her tormentors. 
"You're not going to buy me out," she 
recalled sneering at Coll. “And you can go 
back and tell your boss, the president, that 
he's not going to buy me out either." 

"Why is it the woman is always the one 
who has to leave?" she asked at her depo- 
sition. "I was fighting for that [principle]. 
I'm a single mother. I am the one who 
takes care of my son. I don't have a man 
taking care of me." Asked if she discussed 
Coll's offer with Wolfowitz, she replied, 
"If you think I'm angry now, you should 
see me angry there. I thought he should 
have fought the decision by the ethics 
committee. He became them, you, the 
bank, and I had to fend for myself." 

Woe was Wolfy! He had never signed 
up for a two-front war. At home, his girl- 
friend felt betrayed by his inaction. At the 
bank, pressure was mounting on him to 
do something, regain control of the situ- 
ation, bring his girlfriend to heel—act 
like a man. “You're sleeping with her; you 
solve it!” was the way one of his attorneys 
summed up the bank’s message. To estab- 
lish his authority at the bank, to meet the 
pressing timetable Melkert had abruptly 
imposed for action (“by the end of the 
week,” he told Wolfowitz on Monday, 
August 8) and to salvage his “preexisting 
relationship” with the woman he loved, 
Wolfowitz on August 11 sent Coll a curt 
two-page memo (“Subject: Shaha Riza”) 
laying down the law. 

"I now direct you to agree to a proposal 
which includes the following terms and 


conditions," he wrote Coll. These included 
Riza's secondment to an outside institu- 
tion of her choosing, immediate promo- 
tion to H at an annual midpoint salary of 
$180,000 (a raise of $47,340) and guaran- 
tees of I and J, depending on the length of 
Wolfowitz's term and whether Riza earned 
positive ratings from ad hoc review panels 
to be created specially for her. "Finally," 
Wolfowitz wrote, offering a last blast at the 
nervy Spaniard who had opened a fresh 
mouth to his beloved Shaha, "I wish to 
reiterate my deep unhappiness with the 
whole way of dealing with a situation that 
I still believe, and have been advised by 
experienced labor legal counsel, should 
have been resolved by my recusal." Twenty 
days later Riza and Coll jointly signed a 
letter of agreement 
that made her sec- 
ondment to the State 
Department final. 


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Wolfowitz promptly 
notified Melkert; the 
president withdrew 


his recusal offer and and back. 
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to respond. “Because 
the outcome is con- 
sistent with the 
committee's findings 
and advice," Melkert 
wrote Wolfowitz on 
October 24, "the 
committee concurs 
with your view that 
this matter can be 
treated as closed." 
The next day Mel- 
kert told the bank's 
executive board he 
was pleased to report 
"the conflict of inter- 
est has been dealt 
with appropriately." 
In the ensuing clamor for Wolfowitz's 
head, Melkert's correspondence was largely 
ignored, despite or perhaps because of— 
its offering incontrovertible evidence that 
those World Bank officers paid to exam- 
ine the conflict-of-interest resolutions and 
deem them kosher or not, gave, in this 
instance, their full seal of approval to the 
detestable warmonger and his ballbusting 
companion. Even more damning for Mel- 
kert—who would later claim Wolfowitz 
"excluded" key personnel from the process 
and thereby prevented him and the other 
ethics-committee members from learning 
the terms of Riza's secondment—was the 
handwritten "Dear Paul" note the commit- 


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month. Dated November 25, 2005, the let- 
ter is this case's smoking gun: 


I would like to thank you for the 
very open and constructive spirit 
of our discussions, knowing in par- 
ticular the sensitivity to Shaha, who 
I hope will be happy in her new 
assignment. 

Ad 

PS: Please let me know whether 
you could accept an invitation to 
you and Shaha at our place, prob- 
ably joined by Bob and Beth. 


Here was Melkert, shortly after the 
deal was done, praising Wolfowitz's con- 
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expressing hope that Riza would enjoy 
her new assignment—a far cry from won- 
dering what the hell it was or question- 
ing its ethicality—and even inviting the 
lovers, in the cozy language of couples’ 
cocktail chatter (“probably joined by Bob 
and Beth"), to Melkert's own home. 

At deposition Melkert struggled to 
explain the inconsistency created by his 
contemporaneous correspondence and 
his later claims of ignorance of, and out- 
rage over, the terms of Riza's transfer: 
"We had a discussion then, I remember, 
in the ethics committee, and we consid- 
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that outcome rather than to have a pro- 
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the exact interpretation of the roles of 
the different actors in this.” 

“The impression this gives,” one of 
Melkert's interrogators said, brandishing 
the October 24 letter, “is that the [ethics] 
committee felt that the advice had been 
followed the way it should have been fol- 
lowed.” If not, the examiner continued, 
“maybe there was an opportunity there 
to exercise this [oversight] function and 
act upon this, don't you think?" 

“No,” Melkert shot back. Wolfowitz had 
gotten Riza to accept a position outside 
his line of authority, "and all other mat- 
ters...were considered by us as in fact no 
longer relevant." 

Melkert took a similarly disinterested 
view in January and February 2006 when 
an e-mailer, identi- 
fying himself only 
as John Smith, sent 
the bank's inves- 
tigations hotline a 
pair of angry, highly 
detailed letters 
complaining about 
Riza's "egregious" 
compensation pack- 
age. This time the 
numbers were plain 
for Melkert and 
his high priests of 
ethics to see: "Her 
salary went from 
around $130,000 
(net) to $180,000 
(net)," Smith accu- 
rately reported. 
Ignored for three 
weeks, Smith vowed 
to go public, even 
if it meant "a trial 
by the media that 
would not be fair to 
Paul Wolfowitz and 
would be detrimen- 
tal to the reputation 
of the World Bank." 
The threat was clear: 
reputational risk. 

On February 
28 Melkert finally 
responded, sending 
Wolfowitz a letter 
marked CONFIDEN- 
TIAL and concluding that Smith's alle- 
gations did "not appear to pose ethical 
issues appropriate for further consider- 
ation by the committee" and "did not 
contain new information warranting any 
further review." Here then was a second 
instance when the World Bank's ethics 
cops, presented with highly detailed 
charges, looked at the Riza transfer and 
shrugged: Case closed. Melkert's last 
sentence later formed the cornerstone 
of Wolfowitz's defense: How could the 
chairman of the ethics committee have 
responded to Smith's dollar figures by 
saying they contained no "new informa- 
tion" and then go on to claim, as Mel- 


kert had at deposition, that Riza's "large 139 


PLAYBOY 


140 


initial pay increase” had somehow been 
hidden from him? 


By that point, though, the pendulum 
had already swung. Called to action by 
the Chad episode, Wolfowitz's enemies— 
most notably the leadership of the bank's 
staff association, which represents nearly 
half the institution's 10,000 employees— 
felt emboldened by Smith's challenge to 
the new president's authority. Smelling 
blood, they lunged for the jugular. Had 
Wolfowitz been a beloved figure at the 
bank, the exculpatory conclusion Melkert 
and the ethics committee had reached— 
twice—would have ended the matter. 

Instead, the leaks began. The first 
went to The Washington Post's Al Kamen, 
author of the gossipy In the Loop col- 
umn, which broke the story on March 28, 
2007. Kamen noted that after receiving 
another raise at the State Department, 
Riza was now earning $193,590—$7,000 
more a year than Secretary of State Con- 
doleezza Rice. Kamen correctly reported 
that World Bank staffers are, as a rule, 
"grossly overpaid"—the bank's U.S. 
employees are reimbursed for their fed- 
eral income tax payments, for example— 
but he failed to mention that more than 
1,000 bank staffers are at H level, some 
earning almost $230,000 a year, hundreds 
earning more than the secretary of state. 

Critical pieces in the Financial Times and 
The New York Times swiftly followed, and 
soon the hunt was on, with all its glorious 
post-Watergate trappings: the special inves- 
ligating committee stacked with unsympa- 
thetic umpires (what kind of eye would, 
say, Jiayi Zou, the executive director rep- 
resenting China, cast on Wolfowitz's and 
Riza's many insinuations against Sheng- 
man Zhang?), the East Coast editorials 
calling for resignation, the desertion of key 
aides, the increasing use of the adjective 
embattled and the predawn camera-crew 
stakeouts outside the embattled one's 
house in Chevy Chase, Maryland. 

What even the couple's most implacable 
enemies didn't count on was the dread- 
fully impolitic way Wolfowitz and Riza 


went about defending themselves behind 
the scenes. The first battle Wolfowitz chose 
to wage in his campaign for survival was 
a reckoning with Coll. After an alarming 
inquiry from U.S. News & World Report, 
Wolfowitz summoned the HR executive 
for an angry confrontation in which, Coll 
testified, "he basically accused me of leak- 
ing the information.... He also told me...to 
tell friends, people like Shengman...to get 
out of his way and stop attacking him.... 
And he also stated very clearly that ‘if these 
people fuck with me or Shaha, I have 
enough on them to fuck them, too.'” 

At the same time, the stubborn law- 
yer inside Wolfowitz reared his ugly, spit- 
combed head. "Mr. Wolfowitz, and the 
White House itself, may have erred in pur- 
suing a highly legalistic defense instead of a 
quieter political campaign," The Wall Street 
Journal reported on the morning of May 17, 
the very day Wolfowitz announced his res- 
ignation. Indeed, one of his first steps was 
to retain perhaps the era's most feared and 
loathed criminal defense attorney, Robert S. 
Bennett, the ruddy-faced vétéran de les guerres 
politiques best known for representing Presi- 
dent Clinton in the Paula Jones litigation. 
"Mr. Wolfowitz...then showered the board 
with legal briefs complete with exhibits and 
appendixes," clucked the Journal. 

The big guns—Secretary Rice and Pres- 
ident Bush—never came out blazing, "My 
position is, is that he ought to stay," Bush 
said tepidly at a Rose Garden news con- 
ference on April 30, the day Wolfowitz's 
and Riza's depositions were taken. "And 
I appreciate the fact," Bush concluded, 
“that he has advanced—he's helped the 
World Bank recognize that eradication of 
world poverty is an important priority for 
the bank." This was akin to compliment- 
ing Joe Torre for helping the Yankees 
recognize that winning ball games is an 
important priority for the team. And not 
until May 10 did a spokesman for Rice dis- 
close that the secretary had been lobbying 
U.S. allies on Wolfowitz's behalf. Even so, 
Assistant Secretary Sean McCormack was 
careful to say the lobbying had occurred 
in “a couple of her conversations in the 
course of her ongoing conversations," in 


which she simply "mentioned her personal 
high regard for Paul Wolfowitz and the 
work that he's doing at the World Bank." 
Faint praise, indeed. A senior official at the 
Treasury Department, where the search 
was already under way for a successor to 
Wolfowitz, sighed to a Fox News reporter, 
"We're all, like, Why won't this end?" 

The nail in the coffin was the deposition 
process: Wolfowitz and Riza's last chance 
to curry favor with the men and women 
on the ad hoc committee who would, with 
their final report, decide Wolfowitz's fate. 
Chairman Herman Wijffels, like Melkert 
a balding Dutch politician, emphasized 
that he was presiding over a fact-finding, 
not an adversarial, proceeding, but the 
presence of stenographers and defense 
counsel (permitted to attend but not to 
speak) and the relentlessly negative thrust 
of the interrogation left little doubt about 
the nature of the inquest. Common sense 
dictated that the vilified lovers not antago- 
nize their jurors, but Wolfowitz and Riza 
had other ideas—or maybe they just 
couldn't help themselves. 

Thus when Wijffels commenced Riza's 
deposition by saying sympathetically, "We 
understand how painful this whole episode 
must be for you," the witness interrupted, 
"Do you?" When Wijffels asked if she was 
ready to answer questions, Riza sniffed, "If 
I don't have the answers, there's not much 
I can do about it." She complained about 
the steady stream of leaks—violations, all, 
of the bank's fabled rules and codes—and 
snapped, "I hope to God you will be dealing 
with this issue as well." And she challenged 
the panel members to "have the courage 
to admit" they had handled the various 
cases of lovers and spouses "arbitrarily and 
without clear guidance." Exhausted by the 
end, Wijffels thanked the witness and dead- 
panned, “Your position is fairly clear." 

A more experienced witness, Wolfowitz 
started out dry, factual and nonconfron- 
tational, but this facade of equanimity 
cracked almost immediately after he con- 
cluded his lengthy opening statement. He 
lapsed into expressions of impatience— 
"I'd just say it a dozen times," ^I will say 
it 100 times" and “Look, I repeat" then 


made the short leap into open quarrel- 
ing. “Stop looking for some rule that was 
violated," he commanded the panel. "If 
people keep trying to pin blame on me, 
it's going to damage the institution, and 
it’s going to damage the institution much 
more than it will damage me." There were 
also bursts of self-righteousness and bitter- 
ness: “I really resent deeply all the smears 
about this [having been] a corrupt transac- 
tion designed to pay off my girlfriend.... I 
didn't take this job for money." 

Small wonder the ad hoc committee con- 
cluded Wolfowitz had violated bank rules 
and reserved the question of punishment 
for the full board—a move designed to 
give the president time to realize he must 
resign. This would be his final act of public 
service at the bank, the means by which 
he could stanch the deluge of reputational 
risk drowning them all. Bennett iated 
the final deal. Wolfowitz agreed to resign 
effective June 30, following an exchange of 
public statements in which he, across five 
pages, claimed credit for a string of policy 
successes, and the board, in a single page, 
said it "accepted" Wolfowitz's assurances 
he "acted ethically and in good faith." The 
combatants initially refrained from public 
appearances, as though all were relieved to 
see the thing simply die. 

On May 21, however, Wijffels suffered 
a seizure of candor and told a Dutch 
newspaper that Wolfowitz was hounded 
out of the bank not for the Riza transfer 
but because of his "disastrous manner of 
leadership." "If he had otherwise been 
a good leader," Wijffels conceded, "this 
may not have come so far." Appearing 
on The Charlie Rose Show nine days later, 
Wolfowitz acknowledged that “we had 
gotten to the point where it was really 
not possible to be effective." When Rose 
sought some explanation of the scandal, 
"so we can understand it from you," Wol- 
fowitz demurred. "I don't want to go into 
every gory detail," he said. Undaunted, 
the host probed for some sign of whether 
Wolfowitz and Riza were still together, 
and Wolfowitz suggested they were: 

ROSE: Must be tough for a relationship 
to do this kind of—go through this. 

woLrFowrrz: It's not been easy. But she's 
quite a remarkable, wonderful person. 

"Someday I'll write a book," Wolfowitz 
promised, presumably to include a chapter 
or two on what he termed “the so-called 
ethics issue." Rose wondered if the whole 
thing weren't, as Bennett privately believed, 
a European backlash to the Iraq war. 
"Maybe if it weren't me and somebody else 
doing it," Wolfowitz started to say, referring 
to his efforts to reform the bank's bureau- 
cracy and promote stringent anticorruption 
criteria for its lending decisions. "Somebody 
who's not an architect of the war and all 
that," Rose interjected. “I’m not an archi- 
tect of anything," Wolfowitz snapped, "but 
somebody who is not so closely associated 
with a controversial Iraq policy, yes." 


KIMBERLY BELL 


(continued from page 64) 
selfish in bed, just like he is on the base- 
ball diamond." She pauses and chooses 
her words carefully. "I don't know if I 
should say this, but when you're dealing 
with somebody who's that selfish, with 
that kind of ego, you learn to exaggerate 
your reactions to make him feel better." 
In other words, she faked it. Barry's sex- 
ual tastes, she says, were pedestrian. "He 
was pretty generic in that respect, pretty 
average in all ways," she says. "I don't 
mean that to make fun of anything, but 
his needs were really simple, really basic. 
Which made them not hard to fulfill." 

Outside the bedroom, however, the 
San Francisco Giants’ star player was a 
charmer. Bonds cooked Kimberly din- 
ner and made her a mix CD of sappy 
love songs—Mariah Carey and Kenny 
G. It wasn't just about sex, Kimberly 
says. They found in each other some- 
thing each wanted, needed perhaps. "I 
needed to feel loved," she says. "And 
if he needed an ego boost, he got one 
every time he saw me." He had his 
moods, but she was okay with that. "He 
could be very macho, and women had 
their place," she says. "But I always fig- 
ured he had PMS, like a woman. He's 
grouchy right now, but give him 10 min- 
utes and he'll be fine." 

Three years into the relationship, 
Bonds dropped a bombshell: He was get- 
ting married to another girlfriend, Liz 
Watson, his current wife. But, he added, 
that didn't mean his relationship with 
Kimberly had to change. She remembers 
their conversation: 

"Are you going to have children with 
her?" 

He shrugged and said, "Well, she's 
gonna be my wife. I guess I have to let 
her have one." 

"Does this mean I won't get to see you 
as often?" 

“I won't be able to see you at home as 
much as before," he conceded. "But hey, 
you'll go on the road everywhere with me." 

"How can you get married in a church, 
knowing you're going to do this?" 

"That's why I'm not getting married 
in а church," he said, laughing. "I'm get- 
ting married in a hotel." 

Bonds was at Kimberly's house the day 
before the wedding, she says, and the 
day he got back from the honeymoon. 
Sure enough, she accompanied him to 
spring trainings in Arizona and hit the 
road with him when the team traveled. 

In 1998 St. Louis Cardinals first base- 
man Mark McGwire began getting piles 
of press for his pursuit of Roger Maris's 
single-season home-run record. That's 
when Bonds's steroid use began, Kim- 
berly says. "Barry hated McGwire," she 
says. "McGwire was white, He was the anti- 
Barry: He was everybody's favorite. He 
was breaking all these records, and Barry 
couldn't stand that. Barry had this chip 


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141 


PLAYBOY 


142 


that because he's black, nobody's going 
to let him break the record. And because 
McGwire was a ‘white boy —those were his 
words—he was going to get the pats on the 
back that Barry wasn't going to get." 

PLAYBOY was one of the first publications 
to report in depth about Bonds's connec- 
tions with trainer Greg Anderson and the 
Bay Area steroid lab BALCO (Gunning 
for the Big Guy, May 2004). But Kimberly 
knew something was up long before then. 
She didn't know much about steroids, but 
she knew something was going on with 
Bonds and his trainer. "Anderson was 
always at spring training with us, every- 
where we went," she says. "Barry used to 
have a little satchel, and in the mornings 
he would say, 'Hey, I need to go talk to 
Greg.' They'd grab the satchel and go 
into a room, and then I'd hear the door 
lock. Га be like, "Why would you lock the 
door? I would never burst in on a conver- 
sation you were having.“ 

Kimberly says Bonds flatly admitted to 
her that he was using steroids in 1999, 
after he tore a tendon in his triceps. "It 
looked like a tumor,” she says of the injury, 
which required surgery and sidelined 
Bonds for a chunk of that season. "He 
said steroids build up the muscles faster 
than the joint can handle, and that's why 
his elbow kind of blew out. He absolutely 
told me he was taking steroids." 

She saw his body thickening, his head 
growing bigger, his back developing 
acne, his hair falling out and his testicles 
shrinking. ("They shriveled up," she 


says.) The couple would stand in front 
of the mirror together, and Bonds would 
fret about his new body. 

“Do I look bloated?” he'd ask her. "Does it 
look funny? Do you think this is obvious?" 

Bonds also suffered sexual dysfunction, 
a common steroid side effect. "He tried 
Viagra several times," Kimberly says, "but 
he didn't like it. It changed the color of 
things, affected his vision and stuffed up 
his nose." She pauses and dears her throat. 
"The funny thing about Viagra: It works so 
well, he stayed like that for hours." 

In his late 30s Bonds began to crush 
home runs at a pace he'd never managed 
as a younger player. He broke McGwire's 
single-season record in 2001 on the way 
to passing Hank Aaron's career home- 
run total this past season. At the same 
time, Kimberly saw the emergence of 
what she describes as "a sudden socio- 
pathic personality." Bonds's phone mes- 
sages, which she saved on a series of 
tapes, went from controlling to threaten- 
ing, and in person he was even scarier. 
She says, "It went from ‘I want to know 
where you're at’ to ‘I'm gonna fucking 
kill you. Pm gonna cut your head off and 
leave you in a ditch. And I'm glad nobody 
knows that you and I are tied this close 
together, because that way nobody will 
know it's me when I kill you.' " 

This last threat—to cut her head off and 
throw her in a ditch—was, she says, one he 
frequently repeated. "I used to think, How 
can you say nobody knows? Your family's 
met me, and you call my job every day." 


Kimberly made efforts to recapture the 
good times, and there did prove to be a 
couple of good times left. During spring 
training in 2001, she sat with Bonds one 
evening in Scottsdale, Arizona, admiring 
the desert sunset. He offered to buy her 
a house in the area and gave her a down 
payment, she says, in chunks of $10,000, 
$15,000 and $20,000 in cash—money 
he had acquired by selling autographed 
memorabilia. She says he told her to 
spread the money over several bank 
accounts to avoid government suspicion. 

She moved, but she couldn't support 
herself in Arizona the way she could in 
the Bay Area, where she'd had a good 
job in graphic design. Bonds, she says, 
stopped making the house payments he 
had promised her. Then, in May 2003, 
she flew to see him. That's when she ran 
late and, she says, he pushed her up 
against the wall, choked her and threat- 
ened her life. That's when she decided 
she needed to get out. 

Kimberly saw Bonds once more after 
that, when, she says, he came to Arizona 
and told her she "needed to disappear." 
A few months later federal agents raided 
BALCO and arrested several people, 
including Anderson, who pleaded guilty 
to steroid dealing and money laundering 
and since then has spent a year in prison 
for contempt of court after refusing to tes- 
tify against Bonds in a grand jury hear- 
ing. Kimberly asked Bonds to honor his 
commitment and pay off the $157,000 
balance on her house, but she says his 
lawyers responded by characterizing the 
relationship as "meretricious," painting 
Kimberly as little more than a prostitute 
and offering $20,000 in exchange for 
signing a confidentiality agreement. 

“He wanted to call me an extortionist,” 
she says. "If that's what I was, I wouldn't 
have asked for $157,000. I probably would 
have asked for millions. I just wanted the 
balance due on the house, and I felt I 
deserved that." 

Kimberly has spoken at length to a 
grand jury investigating possible perjury 
charges against Bonds. "People have said 
to me, Watch what you say to PLAYBOY 
because if the story doesn't match what 
you told the FBI and the grand jury, you 
could be in trouble, she says. "But for 
me it's simple: If you tell the truth, your 
story's not going to change." 

She closes the scrapbook that details 
her nine tumultuous years with Bonds. 
“I'm not so afraid of him now," she 
says. "And I'm not afraid of the atten- 
tion. People can call me whatever they 
want to call me. I do want to add that 
it is my fault. I can't blame all this on 
him, because if I hadn't been so stupid, 
I would have seen it myself. It's impor- 
tant that that be said. It's a cautionary 
tale: A woman screwed up and chose the 
wrong person. She should have known 
better. And that's the honest truth.” 


35 YEARS AGO THIS MONTH 
Miss November 1972 Lenna 
Sjoóblom had many fans, but 
the devotion she developed 


From her days as Cinderella at Walt Disney 
World to her sun-kissed rıaysoy pictorials, 


dramas Port Charles and General Hospital. “1 
just shot two episodes, and Гт hoping it will 


Kara Monaco has always glowed in the spot- 
light. Now, with a guest role on the daytime 


turn into a recurring role," says Kara, who 
has also appeared on The Girls Next Door and 
MTV's Scarred. 
Along the way she 
has hosted Playboy 
comedy shows at 
the Palms and ap- 
peared in a skit 
on Jimmy Kimmel 
Live, Meanwhile 
she continues 
to audition. Al- 
though she tries 
out for a wide 
range of roles, 


in the com- 
puter science 
community ў 
was a surprise. 
Not long after 
her pictorial 
appeared, the 
Centerfold 
shot was used 
during one of 
the first elec- 
tronic-image 
transmissions 
conducted at 
USC. Valued 


she's most at- 
tracted to com- 
edy. "It would be 
my number-one 
choice if I could 
pick any genre," 
she explains, Kara 
also says there's 
talk ofa show with 
Jason "Wee-Man" : = E 
Acuna of Jackass, : I love to J Ж 
but she can't dish : wear , ۱ 
about the details : — bustiers, № 

just yet. "We're : always | 
very hopeful," : with 1 
she says. "We're heels." | 
going to pitch it to the networks and see | 
who picks it up." No doubt our Centerfold : | 
will continue to prosper. Clearly there's : , | 
something in the combination of Playmate : 

and Monaco that translates into TV success. : | і 


for its com- 
plex texture, 
the picture 
became the test standard for 
electronic-image processing. 


Coincidence? PMOY 2006 
Kara Monaco (above 
right) has appeared on 
Passions, while Playmate 
Kelly Monaco (right, 

no relation) has built a 
career on daytime TV. 


drama Passions, Kara seems to be following the 
path established by her Playmate predeces- 
sor and unrelated namesake Kelly Monaco, 
who parlayed her appearance as Miss April 
1997 into long-running roles on the daytime 


| AR 


Whether or not 
you have a picture 
in competition, the 
Cannes Film Festi- 
val has long been a 
place to be seen. We 
caught our favorite 
Swede, Miss Decem- 
ber 1996 Victoria 
Silvstedt, there. The 
international party 
girl attended, from 
far left, the premiere 
of My Blueberry 
Nights, the NRJ Music 
Awards, a Dolce & 
Gabbana party, a 
de Grisogono party 
and a charity func- 
tion hosted by social- 
ite Denise Rich 


MY FAVORITE PLAYMATE 
By Paget B Breu uster 


of Crin 


"My favorite ORR is 

Miss June 1955 Eve Meyer. 

She went from pinup to 

producer, proving beauty 

and brains could mix. She made a 
number of groundbreaking cult films, 


like Faster, 
| Pussycat! Killl 
Kill and Beyond 
the Valley of 
! the Dolis. 
It's inspiring 
to see women 
| who have as 
much impact 
© off camera 
as on.“ 


POP QUESTIONS: INDSEY VUOLO 


communications. It's similar to 

my undergraduate degree in 

marketing and communica- 
tions. I'm trying to build 
on my interests, 

Q: What are your favor- 
ite things about living in 
Greece? 

A: The food and culture 


Q: You recently returned to 
grad school and are studying 
in Greece. Why Greece? 

A: I decided to go back to 
school to be more compet- 
itive in the workforce. A 
girlfriend of mine also 
wanted to get her mas- 
ter's, and she told me 
La Salle University and the fact that I made 
offers a master's pro- Ww E + such a huge move. I'm 
gram in the Czech re very lucky! 

Republic and Greece. I Q: What do you miss 
love Greek food and / most from home? 

have always wanted to 7 A: Daily interactions 
visit, so it seemed like the with friends, family and 
perfect opportunity. my dog, Diesel, who stays 
Q: What are you studying? with my parents. I try not to 
A: Гм studying for my mas- think about what I miss so I 
ter’s in public relations and can enjoy my time abroad. 


Sure, we like see- 
ing Centerfolds in 
the nude, but we 
also like thinking 
about them in 
the nude. That's 
why bikinis were 
invented, Here 
(from far left), 
Miss July Tif- 
fany Selby, Miss 
April 2001 Katie 
Lohmann, Miss 
October 2005 
Amanda Paige 
and Miss March 
2005 Jillian 
Grace get two- 
pieced. 


Playmate of the Year 1994 Jenny 
McCarthy was spotted frolicking 
мі beau Jim Carrey in Hawaii. 


ерш was vacationing іп 
En . Miss May 1983 , 


Susie Scott bache re- 
ceived a favorable review e 


ию м mas 


in Publishers Weekly for 

her new book, Angels of a 
Lower Flight.... Playmate of 

the Year 2005 Tiffany Fallon ap- 
peared on the cover of J Do mag- 
azine with her 
husband, Joe 
Don Rooney. 
She also re- 
cently ap- 
peared on Best 
Damn Sports 
Show Period 
and served as 
a celebrity Wa warn. Realy. 
judge for 

the 2007 Hooters International 
Swimsuit Pageant, held in Las 
Vegas.... Miss August 2005 
Tamara Witmer and Miss June 
2004 Hiromi = co-hosted a 


night arty a bit 
ni ya 
farther down 
the Strip.... 
In more rock- 
related news, 
Miss June Brit- 
tany Binger 
hosted a fund- 
raiser called the 
Roar at the Rock 
for special-needs 
children in her home state of 
Ohio.... Timeless beauty Miss 
February 1990 Pamela Anderson 
recently turned 40. She 
celebrated with a giant 
pink cake ata и 
party also іп Las 
Vegas.... Several 
Playmates, in- 
cluding Play- 
mate of the Year 
Sara Jean Un- 
derwood, Hiro- 
mi Oshima and | 
Miss February \! 
2001 Lauren 
Michelle Hill, Birthday ож 
will be featured in the upcoming 
Adam Sandler-produced movie 
House Bunny, which stars Anna 
Faris as а Playboy Bunny. Look 
for it to arrive in fall 2008. 


Tiffany says | Do. 


MORE PLAYMATES 


See your favorite Playmate’s 
pictorial in the Cyber Club 


at cyber.playboy.com or 
download her to your phone 
at ployboymobile.com. 


PLAYBOY 


146 — 


LEINART 


(continued from page 75) 
that year I had to be 100 percent ready 
and focused to do this and be thrown to 
the wolves, which is what this is. I don't 
think I was prepared for that. I loved 
being a kid and being in college, and I 
loved my team and my teammates. 


Q6 

PLAYBOY: You took only one class your 
senior year, ballroom dancing. Should 
we count on seeing you on Dancing 
With the Stars? 

LEINARE Man, I couldn't even remem- 
ber one move from that class if I tried. I 
loved the class, though. It was fun. It was 
pretty much like what you see on Danc- 
ing With the Stars but obviously not that 
intense. There's no chance I'd sign up 


unless it were with eight other athletes 
and I wasn't the only guy making a fool 
of himself. Plus it’s hard. 


Q7 

PLAYBOY: Will Ferrell is a USC alum. The 
NFL Network produced a funny video in 
which he played a USC auxiliary strength 
and conditioning coach. Did you hang 
out with him? 

LEINART: Will is hilarious. The first time I 
met him was when USC coach Pete Car- 
roll had him come out to practice and 
surprise us. He went in the huddle, I 
threw him a bomb, and he dove for it 
and missed. I went to lunch with him 
afterward and got a chance to talk. What 
a great guy. He's obviously a funny per- 
son, but outside of his characters he's just 
a normal dude who was in a frat and did 
the same things any college kid did. 


8 

PLAYBOY: What's the worst hangover 
you've ever had? 

LEINART: It was probably five or six years 
ago. I thought I was dead. I remember 
the whole throw-up thing was happen- 
ing, and I passed out in the shower 
with the water on. My roommate came 
in to see me and then just left me there 
all night. In the morning I woke up 
in the shower with puke all over me. I 
thought I was going to die that day. I 
was thinking, Oh my God, my head is 
going to fall off. I'm not a big drinker 
or anything. I have my fun times, but 
that was a bad, bad experience. 


09 

PLAYBOY: How is your golf game? 
LEINART: Pretty shitty. Since Гм an 
athlete, some of it comes naturally. To 
be honest, Гуе got a natural swing, 
but I'm not any good. I feel I could 
get fairly decent and hold my own if 
I practiced enough, but I'm just too 
lazy to practice right now. And Arizona 
is home to some of the most beautiful 
golf courses in the world. 


0 

PLAYBOY: When you entered the 2006 
NFL draft most analysts figured you 
would be drafted early, possibly to the 
Tennessee Titans or New York Jets. Were 
you surprised when you went 10th? 

LEINART: It didn't surprise me after I was 
sitting there past the third pick, which 
was Tennessee. I knew then there was a 
good chance I would fall to Arizona unless 
some team was going to trade up to get 
me. You're just waiting for your name 
to be called. When Arizona called I was 
excited, but I was also bummed because 
I wanted and expected to go higher. But 
when I look at the things that Arizona has, 
like a new stadium and great players, plus 
being close to home, it is literally the per- 
fect place to be. Now that Гуе been here 
I can say I wouldn't want to be anywhere 
else in the NFL than with this team. 


011 

PLAYBOY: What was the first NFL game 
you ever attended? 

LEINART: It was a preseason game I actually 
played in. Га never seen a game from the 
stands. My first game was against the New 
England Patriots, and it was a surreal feel- 
ing. I remember warming up before the 
game, and everyone was kind of hanging 
out with one another. I thought, Гуе made 
it. Гуе got Junior Seau warming up; Гуе 
got Tom Brady throwing the ball—along 
with all these guys I had watched win 
three Super Bowls. It was incredible. That 
was a fun experience. And I did pretty 
well against them, too. 


Q12 
PLAYBOY: What kinds of insults were 
thrown at you as a rookie? 
LEINART: I got a lot of shit talked to me 


but not as much as | expected. One of 
the Detroit Lions talked some smack to 
те, The Oakland Raiders talked a ton 
of shit to me. They were kicking my ass 
the whole game. I was hoping to get 
out of that game alive, to be honest with 
you. Warren Sapp is the king of talking. 
I think some of the guys in Green Bay 
talked to me, Other than that I had a 
lot of good things said to me. I remem- 
ber John Lynch and Champ Bailey and 
all these guys telling me I was going 
to be a great pro and to keep my head 
up. That goes a long way, especially 
from guys like that. 


Q13 

PLAYBOY: You went from a 37-2 record 
as a starter in college to a 4-7 record 
starting in the NFL. Was it hard to 
adjust to losing? 

LEINART: It was difficult. It really hit me 
when I started to play. The first four 
games we were 1-3, and it was dif- 
ficult, but when you’re on the bench 
you don't feel as much a part of the 
team. You're not contributing. I was 
like, Damn, it sucks. But it's different 
when you're playing. When I got the 
nod and started playing I went five or 
six games before I won even one. I was 
pissed, man. I'm a competitive guy. My 
confidence was low. That's how it goes 
in the NFL. It's a difficult thing, but 
we regrouped and played well the last 
half of the season. I think we went 4-3 
in our last seven games. 


Q14 

PLAYBOY: Arizona Cardinals receiver 
Anquan Boldin talks a lot on the field. 
What's he saying? 

LEINART: Anquan is outspoken. He's 
probably one of the most competitive 
guys Гуе ever been around. He wants 
to win at everything. If I throw a bad 
ball or make a bonehead play, he's the 
one person I do not look at. If I throw 
a bad ball to him, ГИ walk right back to 
the huddle and not make eye contact, 
because I know as soon as I do he'll look 
at me with that glare, He does it even in 
practice. Afterward I joke with him, but 
he's just really competitive. You've got to 
be like that. That's why he's great. 


015 

PLAYBOY: Your friend Ashton Kutcher is а 
big Chicago Bears fan. Did you guys talk 
about your loss to the Bears last season? 
LEINART: We talked about it after the 
game. He was like, "You were just 
awesome out there." I know he had a 
tough time because he was sitting in 
our owner's box. He had a tough time 
rooting for Chicago in our owner's 
suite. I went to his and Demi's home in 
L.A. for the Chicago and Seattle play- 
off game this year, and he came to my 
Monday-night game against Chicago. 
He's a good dude, a guy's guy, and 
Demi is a classy woman. 


016 

PLAYBOY: Nick Lachey is another of 
your good friends. Tell us something 
we don't know about him. 

LEINART: He's terrible at basketball. I 
played with him a little, just shooting, 
and he's awful. I guess some people may 
not know that he went to USC for a vear 
or half a year before he left. He tried 
walking on for the football team as a run- 
ning back. That's a story. To say the least 
I don't think it was his thing. 


Q17 

PLAYBOY: We heard a rumor that the 
wheels were stolen off your car. True 
or false? 

LEINART: Twice. The summer before 
last I came home from practice, and 
my car was on cement blocks. It was a 
professional job. It was irritating. The 
other time was during the season. I 
live in a nicer neighborhood, so I leave 
the cars out in the driveway. I prob- 
ably should have parked in the garage, 
but I didn't think it was going to hap- 
pen. I woke up early because we had 
to be there at six in the morning. I was 
about three quarters of the way into 
the car before I even noticed, because 
I was half asleep. I was so pissed, man. 
I was like, You gotta be kidding me 
that people do this for a living. 


018 

PLAYBOY: Confess to having a crush on at 
least one famous woman. 

LEINART: Right now Га have to say Jen- 
nifer Aniston. She's beautiful and cool 
and has been through a lot in her life, 
especially in recent years. I like the way 
she carries herself, She's strong. For 
someone more my age, I'd have to say 
Gisele Bündchen. I've been a huge fan, 
but now that she's with Tom Brady it's 
a little different. I love Scarlett Johans- 
son. Every guy loves her. There are a 
lot of beautiful women in Hollywood. 


019 
PLAYBOY: So Scarlett Johansson calls 
and wants you to go to the beach with 
her for the day, but you have volun- 
tary practice. Voluntary practice. What 
do you do? 
LEINART: Oh, man, ГА be at practice. Vol- 
untary means mandatory in the NFL. 
Trust me on that one, 


Q20 

PLAYBOY: Okay. Let's say it’s just a session 
of watching film. What would you do? 
LEINART: I'd bring my portable TV, set 
up a little thing on the beach and watch 
film with her. To be honest with you, 
anything to do with football would come 
before anything else. That's just the way 
it is, especially for a quarterback. 


Read the 2 Ist question at playboy.com/2 14. 


NEED 
TO 


UPDATE 


YOUR 
MATERIAL? 


COMEDY 
CLIPS 


UPDATED AND ALWAYS FRESH 


ж ж ж WATCH AT ж ж * 
PLAYBOY.COM/HBOCOMEDY 


RICHARD PRYOR 


LIVE IN CONCERT 


JERRY SEINFELD 


ГМ TELLING YOU 
FOR THE LAST TIME 


RICHARD JEN! 


A BIG STEAMING PILE OF ME 


COMEDY 


AVAILABLE ON DVD AT EN 


©2007 Home Box Office, Inc. AM rights reserved. 
HBO? is a service mark of Home Box Office, Inc. 


Menz evine 


р 


51у Fox 

Should Sylvester Stallone, nearing 60, have 
returned to the ring last year for Rocky Balboa? 
If an actor's vitality can be judged by the 
hotness of his wife (JENNIFER FLAVIN), we say yes. 


L 
x 
$ 
$ 
$ 
Li 
5 
B 

i 


Stretch 
Armstrong 


We can't tell you 
how many letters 
we get asking for 
fourbee girls. 
What are four- 
bees, you ask? 
Beautiful, busty, 
blonde and bent 
like a Bavarian 
pretzel. Fourbee 
fans, meet model 
and contortionist 
DESIREE STARR. 


Eva's Choice 

Dilemma of the day: EVA HERZIGOVA drops a flower. As she bends to retrieve 
it, her glossy new-mommy breasts threaten to break free; simultaneously, her 
skirt hikes up, sharing her secret (Victoria's or less). You have time to gawk at 
only one potential wardrobe malfunction—which will it be? 


Revealing Interview 


CLAIRE DANES: "Go see my new movie, 
Stardust." MTV: "Psst! Your shirt's open." Flammable 
DANES: “No, itopens Friday. And it s called a A 
Stardust.” MTV: “We can see your nipple. : Б: 
А d = GOGA is an office 
DANES: “Море, no nipples. It's PG-13. ў 
manager at a Calgary 


gas-compression 
plant—typical circum- 
stances from which 
one may rocket to 
stardom. With more 
pictures like this, 
she'll be launched 
in no time. 


Second ltem About Girl 
Named Lily Goes Here 


This one's LILY ALLEN. Totally different. British, 
not Canadian. Sings dangerously catchy chick- 
pop; does not work at gas-compression plant. 
Single "Smile" topped U.K. charts in 2006. 


DIOE САТМА US 


а 


Booby Prize 
Yogsswget (o win VH1's Flavor of Love YEJLENE __ 
\ E almost hit the $50,000jäckpot in 
she snagged a modeling contract. Even 


ms LUN | 
и Er A T 


de 
>. 
^ 


Ио! роцгг! 


A LITTLE HELP 


There's only one thing better than a pet robot, 
and that's a pet robot that cleans your house. 
iRobot is the pioneer and leader in the chore-bot 
field with its Roomba (vacuum cleaner) and 
Scooba (mopper) robots. Its new Roomba 560 
($350, irobot.com) has improved suction, a built-in 
talking tutorial (so you don't have to decipher 
its beeps), anti-tassel technology to avoid snags 
and a “lighthouse” control system that makes the 
bot clean an entire room before moving on (pre- 
vious models wandered wherever they pleased). 


m 


І 


IS THERE ANYTHING BREASTS CAN’T DO? 


Finding truly useful products is hard enough. 
Finding products that fulfill two needs at once is 
cause for a party. The geniuses behind Beer- 
belly's beverage-smuggling device have created 
a thing of beauty in the Winerack ($30, thebeer 
belly.com). It's a flask-bra that lets you bring 
booze anywhere you can bring your girlfriend 
and, when filled, bumps her up a couple of cup 
sizes. The more you drink, the smaller your 
pal's rack gets, but thanks to the bust-enhancing 
effects of alcohol, it will look the same. 


ZAPPED 


Some drink coffee for 
the taste, others for 
the kick. Now you 
can drink it for both. 
The folks behind 
Shock Coffee ($10 for 
13 ounces, shockcoffee 
.com) hand-select their 
beans for maximum 
caffeine content, then 
roast them for the high- 
est caffeine yield. The 
result is a jump start 
like no other. We 
weren't optimistic 
about its taste, but to 
our surprise it makes 
a deep, flavorful cup, 
with dark, 
earthy 
overtones. 


LOWERING THE BOOM 


As its name would suggest, this Mini Boombox from 
Suck UK ($50, suck.uk.com) looks like the kind of old-school 
ghetto blaster you would find at a dance-off designed to resolve 
territorial disputes, establish romantic relations or stop a developer 
from demolishing your community center. But there are a few dif- 
ferences between it and the quasi-portable music machines of yore. 
First, it's small, about the size of a clock radio. Second, it takes an 
МРЗ player rather than a cassette. Third, it's made of cardboard 
and arrives in your mailbox almost completely flat. Unfolded, it 
makes a fully functional battery-powered dock, with stereo speak- 
ers and all. Now if you'll excuse us, we have a break-off scheduled. 


COMPLETELY BAKED 


It's almost Thanksgiving—time to stuff 
your piehole. The Sugar Plum Fairy Baking 
Company (tspfbakingco.com) ships its 
delectable pies anywhere in the country 
you need them. The apple ($32) is fairy- 
dusted with organic sugar, while the perfectly 
spiced pumpkin ($32) impresses with 
its leaf-print crust. Tums sold separately. 


ox 


GETTING CARDED 


Playboy and Moneymaker Gaming are 
hosting their second Poker Camp ($10,000, 
playboypokercamp.com) this November. 
The trip includes four nights at the Palms 
in Las Vegas, seminars with pros such as 
David Williams and Chris Moneymaker, 
copious playtime and the chance to win up 
to $100,000 in cash and prizes. Then you 
fly to L.A. for a party at the Mansion, so 
you go home a winner no matter what, 


BO! 


-омея сам, 


THE WRITE STUFF 


The PenAgain is a radical rede- 
sign of one ofthe most ordinary 
objects in the world. It's a silly 
idea—until you write with 

it, See, conventional pens and 
pencils require you to do all 
kinds of gripping with muscles 
that were never built for the 
strain. PenAgain changes your 
leverage points so you can use 
the weight of your hand to press 
down firmly without having to 
hold on tight. The original model's 
overhaul in polished alumi- 
num is called the ErgoSleek 
($25, penagain.com) and starts 
conversations wherever it goes. 


BOARD OF EDUCATION 


Board games are not about competition, they're about getting 
people loosened up. Issue your guests a cocktail, sit them down 
with Cranium Wow ($35, cranium.com) and watch where the night 
leads you. Aimed squarely at adults, it requires players to show 
their skills in a variety of areas, including sketching, sculpting, 
whistling, doing impressions, solving puzzles and answering trivia 
questions. Like our dad taught us, just say no to Yahtzee. 


THE SMART CALL 


Cordless home phones are 
the pack mules of technology: 
They're not flashy, but they 
get the job done reliably 
enough. Well, it's time to 
turbocharge your burro. The 
base of GE's InfoLink phone 
($180, ge.com/phones) con- 
nects to the Internet. Set your 
preferences through a web 
browser and it will send news 
headlines, weather reports, 
sports info, stock prices and 
more to handsets around 
your house. When actually 
making calls, it uses the new 
DECT 6.0 wireless standard, 
which offers interference-free 
talking and won't play havoc 
with your Wi-Fi network. 


WHERE AND HOW TO BUY ON PAGE 127. 


Next Month 


KIM KARDASHIAN—IN THIS SEASON OF GIVING, HERE'S OUR PRES- 
ENT TO YOU. THE LOS ANGELES SOCIETY GIRL TURNED SEXTAPE 
SIREN GRACES OUR DECEMBER ISSUE WITH A SEDUCTIVE LAYOUT. 


MUTE—IN A CONFESSION TO A PRIEST, A TRAVELING SALES- 
MAN TELLS OF HIS ENCOUNTER ON THE MAINE TURNPIKE WITH 
A DEAF-MUTE HITCHHIKER TO WHOM HE RANTS ABOUT HIS 
ADULTEROUS WIFE. MASTER OF THE MACABRE STEPHEN KING 
DELIVERS ANOTHER COMPELLING TALE WITH A TWIST. 


BILL RICHARDSON—THE DARK-HORSE DEMOCRATIC PRESIDEN- 
TIAL HOPEFUL IS ADVANCING QUICKLY ALONG THE BACK STRETCH. 
JEFF GREENFIELD GETS THE NOBEL-NOMINATED GOVERNOR ON 
THE RECORD IN A PLAYBOY INTERVIEW. 


LOVE STORY: THE BALLAD OF SARAH SILVERMAN AND JIMMY 
KIMMEL—PROFILER NONPAREIL BILL ZEHME CAPTURES THE 
FAMOUSLY FUNNY COUPLE. AMONG THE REVELATIONS: EXACTLY 
HOW SILVERMAN'S BREASTS STAY SO SPARKLING CLEAN. 


DEATH OF AN INTERPRETER— CHRISTIAN PARENTI AND AJMAL 
NAQSHBANDI MET IN 2004 IN AFGHANISTAN, WHERE NAQSHBANDI 
WORKED AS A GO-BETWEEN FOR WESTERN JOURNALISTS AND 
THE TALIBAN. THIS YEAR HE WAS BEHEADED. IN A QUEST FOR 
ANSWERS, PARENTI RETURNS TO AFGHANISTAN TO FIND A 
LETHALLY BUNGLED WORLD BEHIND THE FRONT LINES. 


MISS DECEMBER 


CARTOONS OF CHRISTMAS PAST—OH, SANTA! EDITOR-IN-CHIEF 
HUGH M. HEFNER CURATES THE BAWDIEST, FUNNIEST COLLEC- 
TION OF HOLIDAY ILLUSTRATIONS EVER TO APPEAR IN OUR PAGES. 


2007 MUSIC POLL—IT'S BEEN AN EXHILARATING YEAR IN MUSIC, 
SPARKED BY THE E-DISTRIBUTION REVOLUTION. MORE THAN EVER 
WE WANT TO HEAR WHAT TICKLES YOUR EARBUDS. 


SEXUAL IMAGININGS—A PULITZER PRIZE-WINNING AUTHOR 
PLAYFULLY NARRATES THE INTERNAL DIALOGUE OF ICONIC COU- 
PUNGS. FRESH SUPPOSITIONS BY ROBERT OLEN BUTLER 


GIRLS OF GAMING— DROP YOUR CONTROLLERS AND POWER 
DOWN YOUR MONITORS, IT'S THE RETURN OF YOUR FAVORITE 
DIGITAL DOLLS AND VIRTUAL FEMMES FATALES, NUDE. 


CELEBRITY CRUSHES—IN THE MOST POETIC TERMS, A HOST OF 
AMERICA’S TOP LITERARY TALENTS, INCLUDING JIM HARRISON, 
SHERMAN ALEXIE, PAULA FOX AND MAUREEN GIBBON, CON- 
FESS WHO THEY'D MOST LIKE TO GET BETWEEN THE SHEETS. 


PLAYBOY'S HOLIDAY GIFT GUIDE—ALL THE TOYS YOU WANT 
UNDER ONE TREE, WITH ONE IN THE DRIVEWAY. 


PLUS: SEXIN CINEMA AND THE HOTTEST MOMENTS ON CELLULOID, 
20Q WITH JOAQUIN PHOENIX, COLLEGE BASKETBALL PREVIEW, 
HOLIDAY FASHION AND MISS DECEMBER SASCKYA PORTO. 


Playboy (ISSN 0032-1478), November 2007, volume 54, number 11. Published monthly by Playboy in national and regional editions, Playboy, 680 

North Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, Illinois 60611. Periodicals postage paid at Chicago, Illinois and at additional mailing offices. Canada Post Cana- 

dian Publications Mail Sales Product Agreement No. 40035534. Subscriptions: in the U.S., $29.97 for 12 issues. Postmaster: Send address change to 
152 Playboy, PO, Box 2007, Harlan, Iowa 51537-4007. For subscription-related questions, call 800-999-4438, or e-mail circ ny.playboy.com.