Good-bye girls

The Girls Next Door are moving down the street

We met them nearly four years ago: three young, unsophisticated, wide-eyed blondes who gave TV viewers a look at the strange and wonderful life behind the gates of the Playboy Mansion. They came from up and down the West Coast, from San Diego to Alaska, to slip into this adult fantasyland as the girlfriends of playboy's Editor-in-Chief, Hugh M. Hefner. But after E! debuted

The Girls Next Door, in August 2005, Holly Madison, Bridget Marquardt and Kendra Wilkinson didn't stay wide-eyed unso-phisticates for long. Over the course of five seasons viewers got to know Holly's old-Hollywood glamour, Bridget's Hallow­een obsession and Kendra's crazy laugh, and before long E! had its biggest hit and the Playboy brand had attracted a huge new (and largely female) following.

As for those three young blondes: In Hef's words, "You can't begin to over­estimate the extent to which their lives have been changed. They are much more mature, sophisticated people now. They're celebrities, but they're also a good deal more than that."

In a way, it all made perfect sense: playboy, after all, had been showcasing "girls next door" since the summer of 1955, when Janet Pilgrim went from a desk in the subscription department to a spot as Miss July. But Holly, Bridget and Kendra brought a new twist to a longtime tradition, turning playboy's girls next door into The Girls Next Door. "It personalized what goes on here at the Mansion," says Hef, "and brought us a whole new group of fans."

And now, as you may have heard, there are big changes. As the fifth sea­son of The Girls Next Door comes to an end, the story lines for season six have

taken an unexpected turn: The original girls are leaving the Mansion to follow different paths, while a whole new cast of contenders (and maybe a few pre­tenders) is moving in.

All three girls are undergoing major life changes, but for Holly, perhaps, the change is most dramatic. Holly has spent the past seven years at Hef's side, first as one of seven girlfriends, then as number one among three and lately as the one who shared his room and his life. "I can say without reservation that Holly really is and has been the love of my life," Hef says. "Over the past couple of years, even though I had three girlfriends, it increas­ingly focused into a one-on-one relation­ship with Holly. I expected to spend the rest of my life with her."

But Holly wanted something more. She wanted marriage and children. Hef is still legally married to his second wife, Kim-berly Conrad Hefner, Miss January 1988.

That marriage ended badly, and he wasn't eager to try wedlock again. So Holly has had a change of heart. Her decision to end the long, intensely romantic relationship was unexpected. Hef says. But she says he should have seen it coming.

Rumors of a romance with Las Vegas magician Criss Angel have added fuel to the fire. Hef and I will always be close." Holly says, "but I just want different things. I don't want to be on somebody's arm all the time. I want new experiences. I want to see everything life has to offer."

When Holly told Hef she wanted to end the relation­ship, he says. "I was literally blindsided by it, and for a couple of weeks I was roadkill." His adjustment to the new single life was made easier with the arrival of the Shan­non twins. Karissa and Knstina. two upcoming Playmates from Florida, who said they were interested in becoming his girlfriends. Those two have now moved into the Man­sion, where, Hef says, "an extraordinary number of young ladies" are also vying for his attention. "The only advice I ever gave Hef," Holly says, "is to look for nice girls who will treat him with respect."

Holly now has her own place near Playboy Studio West, where she works in the magazine's photo department. She swears she doesn t miss the staff that was ready to attend to her every need inside the Mansion. "When I was in college I lived with roommates in ghetto-esque apart­ments, so I'm used to running out to the grocery store or McDonald's in the middle of thenight," she says. "Ever since I moved out of the Mansion I've felt more in touch with the girl I used to be."

The Holly-Hef breakup came as a particular shock to Kendra, who had already been thinking about the day

she would be on her own. "The timing was a huge surprise to me," Kendra says. "I was like, What? Everybody thought I would be the first one out of the Mansion!"

Kendra had been planning her move even before she ran into Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver Hank Baskett at a Playboy golf tournament. A huge football fan, she had always sworn never to date the players, but something about Baskett made her reconsider. "I always thought football players were like hot boy toys, kinda," she says, laughing. "I like to go with the good guy, not the bad boys. But there was something about his energy and the way he carried himself. I knew I couldn't leave without giving him my number."

They started dating, Baskett popped the question a few months later, and Kendra immediately knew whom she wanted to give her away at the wedding. Hef was "proud and pleased" to do so and offered to host the wedding and reception at the Playboy Mansion (where Holly will be a bridesmaid). "I think Hef has always looked at me like a lost little soul," Kendra says, "and now I think he's really proud of me. If it weren't for Hef, I would never have met Hank. Hef carried the torch a long distance and then handed it to Hank, and Hank lit it." The wedding will figure into the next season of GND and in a spin-off series focusing on Kendra's life outside the Mansion.

Bridget, meanwhile, has her own televi­sion series. Bridget's Sexiest Beaches, which debuts on the Travel Channel in March, has sent her around the world in recent months on trips to Australia, Jamaica, Fiji, Thailand, Ibiza and (text concluded on page 106)

GIRLS

(continued from page 92) Croatia, among other locations. (In those last two spots she was recognized on the beach by GND fans.)

"From the beginning I've wanted to host my own show, and I think this is the start of a whole new career," Bridget says. "But I don't think this is the end of the road for the Girls Next Door, because I truly believe Holly, Kendra and I will be friends and do things together for the rest of our lives."

Will viewers embrace new girls the way they've embraced Holly, Bridget and Kendra? "That's the big question,"

admits Hef, "and at this point there is absolutely no way of knowing." But he does know the next season will pro­vide a little of everything: the further adventures of our old favorites, plus the arrival of new girls with all the attendant drama, as well as the life of Hefner him­self, unexpectedly "back in the game" at the age of 82.

"We always knew season six would be a season of transition, but nobody knew exactly what that meant," he says. Then he laughs. "Reality caught up to what we were planning, and now we're dealing with a whole new adventure."