Last year, to my surprise, I was offered a spot on one of the 12 covers of Playboy. My conversation with my former boss, the president of Ukraine, in summer 2021 played in support of this decision – a rather casual lunch where we discussed opportunities to work with the international media. Then Volodymyr Zelenskyy asked me to talk to Men’s Health magazine about getting him on the cover.
Weighing the pros and cons, I thought: If the President of the country wants to fulfill his dream, of an ordinary man, by being on the cover of one of major men’s magazines, why can’t his former press secretary show up on the cover of another one? Especially, if it wasn’t nude, as the Playboy representatives promised.
But, apparently, this was not in the cards: We were no longer engaged in this wish of Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and I never had enough courage to do the Playboy cover.
Playboy has long been trying to get interviews of political figures, preferably with a photo shoot with some level of candor. After all, politics, like power, remains one of the sexiest models.
Donald Trump was proud of his 1990 Playboy cover. The magazine was once quoted by Ronald Reagan. The loss of ratings for Democrat Jimmy Carter was marked by his Playboy interview, where he admitted that he “looked at many women with lust” and “committed adultery in my heart many times.”
This year Playboy came out in Ukrainian for the first time since it was out here in 2005 – an issue that also involves the publication in politics in one way or another. Earlier it was published only in Russian.
“The legendary magazine and online communication is now exclusively in Ukrainian,” – the announcement on Facebook said.
This attempt to become more accessible to a circle of Ukrainian-speaking patriots is most likely closely linked to the requirement for the publishing business to act on the new language laws of Ukraine, introduced by ex-President Petro Poroshenko.
According to this law, newspapers and magazines must be published in Ukrainian. Also, the press can be published in another language, provided that a Ukrainian-language edition of this publication is published simultaneously, along with the corresponding foreign-language edition.
However, Playboy looks quite organic in Ukrainian, so that I would say patriotism in Ukrainian is naturally sexy. The cover of Playboy Ukraine January 2022 looks a little more like a product for intellectuals, focusing on such topics as art, eco-life, body freedom, body positivity, psychology and, of course, boundless pleasure of life.
Interestingly, it was this month that the long-awaited series “Playboy Secrets” came out, where in the very first episodes in exclusive interviews the truth about Playboy founder Hugh Hefner’s empire is revealed, which he tried to hide for many years. Already the first episodes question the established image of Hefner as a symbol of change and the father of the sexual revolution. There are drug-fueled orgies, violent blackmail of Bunnies, body-shaming, public humiliation, and violence.
Apparently, while Playboy is reasserting its image as a super scandalous media, the Ukrainian version strives for tradition and even avoids the crude vulgarity with which the magazine might be associated.
Any Ukrainian conservative would love an interview with lawyer and businesswoman Anna Rudnik, mother of four, who says that her secret to happiness is love. Unless, of course, her erotic photos are shown. As for the CEO of the international payment system LEO, Aliona Shevtsova, who last year brought Elon Musk’s mother, May Musk, to Ukraine, she did not even have to undress.
Playboy also takes us behind the scenes of its work, presenting an interview with photographer Amer Mohamad, one of the chief photographers of the glamorous world of today.
Here are wholly practical tips on how to improve your bachelor pad design, easy way out of the holiday season, ten myths about sustainability. And quite after the aristocratic shoe rubdowns of the Royal Family, Anastasia Rybka briefly lurks with tips on how to give expensive gifts.
This is where political reality brought me back. Even though no one from politics got into the magazine, Anastasia Rybka once appeared in the world’s main publications thanks to political journalists. Just as former Bunnies now reveal the dirty secrets of the magazine’s founder, a few years ago Rybka revealed the secrets of escorts, and with them the secrets of Russian oligarchs involved in corruption and international scandals.
In principle, such conservatism of Playboy can be easily explained by the Ukrainian law on the protection of public morality. According to it, watching pornography is possible, but its distribution is under taboo. And the photo, containing naturalistic image, as close as possible to the real human anatomy and physiology, is among the legal definitions of Ukrainian smut. So, Playboy is maneuvering on the edge, and in Ukraine it will not be able to move away much from the image of an “intellectual magazine”, even having a porn star on its cover.
Such variegated content of Ukrainian-language Playboy suggests that the magazine wants to be accepted by a rather conservative Ukrainian society, reserving the traditional right to intellectual platitudes and exotic peppers that excite what-not much more than the spice of the sexual impulse. For the most part, Playboy feeds the brain with emotions, not intimate fantasies.
Within this and becoming more patriotic thanks to transition to Ukrainian Playboy can become more attractive to Ukrainian political figures. Some of them might consider to find courage about generous offer to appear on a cover of the sexiest magazine ever.
