Bridget Marquardt Says A&E Playboy Documentary Was One-Sided

Bridget Marquardt, Kendra Wilkinson, and Holly Madison were Playboy publisher Hugh Hefner's trio of girlfriends during the 2000s. They also starred in the wildly popular show, "The Girls Next Door." The series put Marquardt, Wilkinson, and Madison on the map and made them reality stars. From time to time, Marquardt delights her nearly 500,000 followers with throwback photos of herself, Wilkinson, and Madison. While fans saw glimpses of life with Hefner on the popular series, Marquardt also spoke with Madison on her "Girls Next Level" podcast in 2022 (via Newsweek) about some of the not-so-glamorous aspects of their lives. One of these things included how Hefner's girlfriends had to ask the Playboy founder for an allowance.

Many of Hefner's other former flames also spoke poorly about the late Playboy star in the A&E documentary, "Secrets of Playboy." In an interview with People to promote the documentary, many women, including Audrey Huskey, made startling allegations against Hefner. She shared that Hefner invited her to his room and it seemed innocent enough until he proceeded to get on top of her with no pants. "I didn't say anything. I didn't give him permission," she revealed. "What was I going to do? If he said no, would he have stopped? I don't know." Sondra Theodore, another former girlfriend of Hefner said, "if I admitted [how he treated me], it made my story — the fairy tale — turn into a nightmare."

But Marquardt has a slightly different take on her time with Hefner.

Bridget Marquardt is not mincing words on her opinion on the A&E documentary, "Secrets of Playboy." The former reality star spoke on Anna Faris' podcast "Anna Faris Is Unqualified."  The ladies covered various topics in the sit-down, including Marquardt's take on the documentary. "The A&E documentary that recently came out was really scathing towards Hef, the mansion life, and everything, and I can not discredit any of those claims," she told Faris. "I mean, I was not there when those [things] were happening; it was a different time, so I believe that those things happened to those women, and I feel awful about it."

Hugh Hefner's former girlfriend added that while she believes the people in the documentary had those negative experiences, hers was mostly "positive," and she didn't think she would "fit the narrative" of the documentary. Marquardt did sit down for "hours," but said the documentary only used "snippets" of her interview and "only things that corroborated Holly's stories," leaving out the positive ones. "So as much as I believe everything that happened, I still feel like it was very one-sided," she said.

In 2021, Marquardt revealed to E! News that Hefner visited her in a dream after he died, and that felt "so, so, so real."She added, "I didn't get to say goodbye to him. I didn't like that. I tried to go up and say goodbye to him, and I wasn't able to," but the dream gave her some closure.