Crystal Hefner Came Too Late

Half the trick of business is knowing when to get out, and Hugh Hefner was a great businessman. “His timing was perfect,” said the New York Times obituary, when he died in September 2017. The comment referred to Hefner’s genius for anticipating the desires of a more libertarian, more consumerist post-war America: Playboy was the perfect product for the moment, selling a tasteful vision of sexual freedom — a vision that, crucially, women could buy into.