Holly Madison Insists Hugh Hefner Wasn't a 'Helpless Old Man' Being Taken Advantage of Despite Public Perception

Former Playboy Bunny Holly Madison continues to set the record straight about her time with the adult brand.

In a new interview, the star emphasized that regardless of what the public thought, she was never dating Hugh Hefner for his fame and fortune. In fact, she said the late entrepreneur was always the one in the power position.

"There was this odd idea that I think a lot of people had back then that Hef was this helpless old man who was just looking for love and anybody involved with him was coming in and taking advantage," the mom-of-two, 43, explained. "Which wasn’t really the case when I was there."

The reality TV personality added that despite Hefner's age — he died at 91 in 2017 — the businessman ran a strict household.

"Going into Girls Next Door, on the very first day, I just knew they were going to try to shape me a certain way or start drama or embarrass me. I was always so scared being in front of the camera and so worried about what I was going to say," she confessed of feeling intimidating. "I was also worried like, ‘Am I going to get in trouble with Hef at the mansion?’"

Despite her constant anxiety, the Down the Rabbit Hole author kept her worries to herself while dating Hefner, who she was with from 2001 to 2008.

"I didn’t feel like I could ever really be myself in front of the camera until I started doing YouTube during quarantine," she said. "That’s the first time I felt like I could like look at a camera and connect with people on the other end."

After exposing the misogyny and toxicity that went down behind closed doors, Madison feels like a weight has been lifted off her shoulders.

"I’m just so tired of having to be fake. Anytime somebody approaches me, which was like every day of my life, people would ask, ‘Oh, do you miss the Mansion?’ and I would always say nice things just because I don't want to get into it with strangers, necessarily," the blonde bombshell shared. "And because I just thought that was the nice thing to do. This gets to a point where it starts to make you physically ill when you're just living a lie like that."

The model acknowledged that Hefner welcoming her into the Playboy brand gave her a head start in Hollywood, but she believes she's solely responsible for her rebirth.

"Everybody wants to assume that every opportunity you have now comes back to that one person, which, in a way, it does," stated Madison. "But when I left the show, I was on my own. It was up to me to make lemons out of lemonade. I don’t get any credit for that."

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Bustle interviewed Madison.