The Bunny Years (9 page)

In truth, there were girls with plain faces, exotic faces, plump to bony figures, big to virtually nonexistent breasts; there were waifs to heiresses to statuesque showgirls. And every ethnic combination under the sun. You would have to wait a couple of decades to see as much multiculturalism and ethnic diversity on a college campus as could be found in the Bunnies' locker room, circa 1963.

Two days later, on February 22, Gloria Steinem wrote that she turned in her costume for the last time, concluding that there was nothing more for her to learn. She packed up and went home. Two months later,
Show
magazine ran “A Bunny's Tale,” and Steinem went on to a storied career, leaving us behind in her wake.

Gloria Steinem at a New York Party . . .

The article portrayed virtually all the Bunnies as hapless, malleable victims, and claimed that she, Gloria, working as a Bunny, felt less honest than a presumed hooker she passed on the street outside the Playboy Club:
As I walked the last block to my apartment, I passed a gray English car with the motor running. A woman was sitting in the driver's seat, smoking a cigarette and watching the street. Her hair was bright blonde and her coat bright red. She looked at me and smiled. I smiled back. She looked available—and was. Of the two of us, she seemed the more honest.

I had worked at the Playboy Club at the same time as Gloria, and I could easily identify myself among the Bunnies she had specifically described and quoted in her article. I recalled the occasions in which she and I had crossed paths in the dressing room, talked during a meal in the employee lounge and sat next to each other in Bunny training. She certainly knew, then, why I was working at the Playboy Club because I had told her: I saw it as a good part-time job that didn't interfere with my acting classes at the Academy. It never occurred to me that delivering a drink order and collecting payment for it constituted anything remotely resembling prostitution.

. . . three years after shedding the Bunny costume.

And neither had it occurred to the other remarkably ambitious Bunnies I had befriended, all of whom took the work in stride. There was Lauren, of course, who delighted in mocking the job, but never the women who worked at Playboy. And Susan,
who, as a full-time university student, relished the campus notoriety she attained when it became known that she worked as a Bunny. And there was Sabrina, who set a rigid one-year time limit on her tenure at Playboy. Years later, after working as an actress, she became an attorney and ran for a congressional seat in California.

Sabrina has always been generous about offering shelter to strays. I remember staying with her for a short time before I moved into my apartment on 30th and Madison Avenue. She lived in a wonderfully eccentric, ramshackle building in a shabby backwater of the Village. The crooked old house had a fireplace, cozy thrift-shop furniture and sloping floors. Sabrina had painted the floorboards in a rainbow of colors.

Sabrina introduced me to Chumley's bar and the after-hours jazz joints in the East Village. I remember riding on the back of Sabrina's motorcycle, tearing down Park Avenue after work. Coming home late at night to her neighborhood was an adventure. The streets, as desolate and eerie as a moonscape, were deserted except for rats until the wholesale meat-packing plants opened in the early hours of the morning. Smoky, open fires burned in bins and oil drums until dawn. Finding a taxi was a chancy business. Most often, I was forced to walk through those bleak, shadowy streets to Eighth and Broadway to catch a subway.

On February 22, I wrote home:
I'm just working weekends at the Club now because we have exam plays at the Academy. I've also written a piece that's passed the first elimination—I may get to direct it. Thank God for meals at the Club, though—they had spareribs. Also, I'm able to put more money aside now—maybe I can afford some dental work. I really ought to get my teeth straightened. A Bunny with braces would be quite a novelty. I wonder if they'll let me.

On April 3, I wrote home:
I'm thrilled! I've been cast in two exam plays, both to be directed by Max Fisher at the ANTA Theatre on Broadway. We rehearse from 2 until 6, so I will have to go back to the weekend schedule at the Club—and they are being really good about my work schedule. Thank you for sending my spring clothes—and guess what, I really did grow an inch.

May 6, 1963:
Good news! Out of 87 girls at the Club, I'm rated #18—which is exceptionally good since they only see me 10 hours a week now. It also means that I'm considered a strong Bunny, capable of the more difficult, busy stations. We have seven different rooms and tips, of course, are better in the busier rooms.

Two weeks later, I managed to land an interview with the New York Drama Guild for an Academy scholarship. I worried that telling the board members I was a Playboy Bunny would not enhance my chances of winning a scholarship.

May 20, 1963:
Last Thursday I went into Miss Fuller's office to meet the Drama Guild representatives. I was replaced at the Club at 3, dressed and grabbed a cab to get to the Academy by 4. I changed into my orange seersucker dress, combed my hair into a flip and wore glasses so I didn't look too much like a showgirl. Miss Fuller said I looked so fresh in my “gay little spring dress.” So I guess I passed muster. Then Miss Fuller asked me if I worked and I mentioned that I was now working as a waitress. Miss Fuller asked where and I said, “Oh, a little supper club on the East Side,” and she started to ask which one, but Mr. Letton jumped in and saved my hide by telling everyone about my performance in the final exam play.

July 6, 1963:
Well, here's a bit of news—I'm “Bunny of the Week,” chosen by the bartenders and room directors—isn't that nice? Also, I went to a film audition yesterday and I believe I've been cast in a comedy, which begins shooting in New York the latter part of July.

By the end of July, I got the scholarship. After filming a small role in
The Troublemaker
, I took a leave of absence from the Club and flew home to visit my family in August. I returned to school in September and landed the part of Isabel in our production of
The Enchanted.
Even with the scholarship, I returned to work at the Club, doing 10-hour stints on weekends.

I wrote home:
I can always be a Bunny when I need money! Also, I've outgrown my clothes. Do you think you could make me another dress like the striped one—just use the same pattern, but make it a little broader in the shoulders and collarless? Enclosed is $10 for material—but don't do it if you are too busy.

Increasingly, school was demanding more time. One day at the club, I ran into Keith Hefner. Apparently, there had been a Bunny meeting I hadn't attended. I reminded him I had acting school until 1 every day and, perhaps recalling his Actor's Studio days, he said, “Go, my child, you have my blessing—acting classes always come before work!” Soon after, I began training Bunnies on Saturday and Sunday nights, a $20 bonus each night besides tips and salary.

September 19, 1963:
Some wonderful news! Our play will be taken on tour to Buffalo and Albany after our opening October 17 at the AADA—a paying audience!

September 27, 1963:
I'm moving! I found a 2 1/2-room rent-controlled apartment in a great building on Madison Avenue and 30th Street, across the street from the new American Academy building. The fireplace really works and the bathroom is big and old-fashioned. It'll cost me $110 a month, but I can manage.

That fall, I got my first real on-camera job, a television commercial for a hair spray—and with it, a new name. The theatrical agent who sent me on the audition was an elderly woman and a bit hard of hearing. When I told her my name, Kathryn Kringstad, she couldn't grasp my last name. Since she was on the telephone with the casting director at the time, I kept mouthing my name and trying to spell it for her. She gave me a fierce look, clapped her hand over the mouthpiece and demanded to know what the hell kind of name that was! She looked down at the box of Lady Scott tissues on her desk and when she resumed speaking to the casting director, she said my name was Kathryn Scott. I got the job as Kathryn Scott, and I joined Screen Actors Guild as Kathryn Scott.

I then faced the terrible prospect of calling my parents to tell them I had changed my name. It didn't help matters that my family name was also the name of my father's birthplace in Norway.

“But why?” my mother asked when I called home with my latest bulletin from Pluto. I could hear my father breathing on the extension phone. I was sure my brothers were hovering in close proximity.

“Because, you know . . . I wouldn't ever want to embarrass the family name . . .” I mumbled in complete embarrassment.

Pause . . . alarm. My mother's quiet voice asked, “What are you thinking of doing that might embarrass us?”

“Oh, honestly, Mother, nothing! But, well, you know.”

Of course, my parents didn't know. I didn't know. After another pause, my mother mumbled, “Don't be silly. I don't think anyone even knows our name out there.”

For my part, I've always been grateful the hard-of-hearing agent didn't have a box of Kleenex on her desk. Imagine explaining that one.

I also slowly weaned myself off my mother's dressmaking.

October 7, 1963:
Today is the one-year anniversary of my arrival in New York—do hope you save my letters, because one day I know I will want to remind myself of my first year in New York.

The following summer, my parents and my kid brother drove from Minneapolis to spend a week with me in New York. I made special arrangements with the general manager so that my folks could visit the Club. I was working in the Playmate Bar when they strolled in. Luckily, I had a table free that gave them a good view. I brought them each a Tom Collins, “dipped” and showed off a bit. My mother scanned the wall of illuminated blowups of Playmates and idly asked if one particular picture was of me. Just as casually, I looked over my shoulder and asked, “that one, Mother?” I wanted to shout, “NO, MOTHER! THAT WOMAN IS COMPLETELY NAKED!!!”