After three months of singing, Hef heard me practicing once. He tried to convince me to quit singing lessons because there was no chance of being good at it. Of course, I cried a lot when he said that, but it was my money that I was investing in lessons so I continued partly out of spite and partly because I really wanted to do it.
Barbi Benton
The best thing is one hour of aerobics and one hour of anaerobics.
What I don't like is the way people automatically think I am a kept woman, that he pays my expenses. This puts me in a rage. I've always paid my own way, even while living in his mansion. I've kept an apartment of my own. In fact, I not only buy my own clothes, but many of Hef's, too - he just hates to shop.
I know that part of my success on stage is due to the fact that I've kept myself together.
I love clothes and jewelry. I'm the fashion lady type.
When I first came to Southern California I enrolled at UCLA in pre-med. My fathers a doctor. But the sight of blood turns me off, so I began doing television commercials.
It took me five years to learn how to sing.
Bill Cosby was one of the first people I met at the Mansion, shortly after I met Hef in 1968.
People recognized us together and our names were synonymous. Whenever you heard Barbi Benton, you think of Hugh Hefner. And I loved that. I was his girlfriend and he was my boyfriend.
Anybody that was famous found their way to the Playboy Mansion. It was exciting for me. But I didn't know half of them!
I like low-cut clothing because I am a believer that one should emphasize their best points.
My singing teacher said it would take three years before I could sing well enough to be accepted as a professional. They were wrong. It took me five years.
I like nice things. I've always had nice things.
I honestly think that Hef had a lot to do with women making more money and getting better jobs. He's had a huge impact on the entire world, and I think that's for the better.
My real name is Barbara Klein and I'm from Sacramento.
When we first dated, I would not go home with Hef, so the only way that he could see me was by taking me out. We went out quite a bit.
If it were up to me, I wouldn't have security. But Hef thinks I'm naive. He feels I'm vulnerable to kidnapping.
I buy unknown, lower-name brand jeans. I don't care about the name brands, if I look good in the jeans I don't care who made them.
You can't let fashion tell you what to do. If it doesn't look good on you you're better off without it.
People automatically assume that if I get anywhere it's because of my association with X, Y or Z, or because I'm pretty.
I was studying pre-med at UCLA when I decided show business was for me, and the best way to make it was in music. I had just one problem. I was tone deaf.
I was also dating someone from UCLA and also I had another suitor, Jimmy Caan. So it was between my college boyfriend, Jimmy Caan and Hef. And Hef won. Within a few months, we were exclusive.
When he died, he took a big piece of me with him. I'm sure that every time I do something, I'll think about having done it with Hef.
Hef was very protective of the women who went to the Mansion.
Hef has always been attracted to younger women. He loves to see the world through the eyes of someone seeing it for the first time.
Circus lions are mean. They don't know anything about affection training.
But I'd like to be taken seriously as a singer.
People are surprised that I can walk and talk.
Nobody thought I could do anything with a singing career... except my singing teachers, who were accustomed to hearing voices that could be transformed into something.
I don't wish to sound chauvinistic, but I feel the female body is beautiful to look at, more so than a male's.
As for those who condemn Hef, he's done a great deal for women's lib and sexual liberation as well.
When I first met Hef, I didn't like him at all. I thought he was too old.
I've lost a lot of fat and that's through weight lifting.
I have this problem where I'm never satisfied with what I do.
I will never be Barbra Streisand, but I have done an awful lot more than what I was sent out to be.
What I really want is to create a name based on my own accomplishments.
Of course, I'm not exactly the girl next door.
Actually, diamonds are a very common stone. I prefer emeralds.
Frankly my parents didn't like him. They objected to the things he stood for. Besides, daddy and Hef are the same age.
It's a hindrance in trying to get a serious acting role. The minute a producer has a script and my name comes up, they immediately think of 'Playboy,' 'Hee Haw,' 'Fantasy Island' and 'Love Boat.'
With Hef it was a relationship. It's the world that made a big thing out of it.
The new age disc jockeys and program directors have accepted me as a new age artist, along with Shadowfax and the rest, and they're playing my songs.
I considered Hef a one-woman man.
I'd like to play Vegas as a head-liner.
One thing I love is that I don't have a lot of people running around Hollywood saying 'I've had her,' because guys love to talk, especially about celebrities.
One never knows when the angels are coming to get you, but everybody has to go.
When I first met Hef, I was a co-ed at UCLA.
It's not that I don't have talent. I've had four gold albums in Scandinavia and they never heard of me as anything but a singer.
I look at the feminine body as a piece of art.
At 35 women are at the bottom level of middle age but we can look like we are absolutely in our prime. Even if you're badly out of shape, you can put yourself in good shape in two years, maximum.
