Playboy Magazine published what it claimed was an interview with Abbie Hoffman back when he was living in hiding as a fugitive. Oui Magazine, then a sister publication of Playboy, published at least one article that was claimed to be written by him. Such things had to be taken on faith if at all. After Hoffman stopped hiding, did he ever authenticate these contacts and others?
Is there any evidence that Playboy, or it’s sister magazine Oui Magazine, ever faked interviews?
Abbie Hoffman had a different interpretation of what “in hiding” meant than you or I might.
During his fugitive period, Hoffman was not only giving interviews and writing articles, he was working on a screenplay and trying to sell it.
Abbie lived most of his days in hiding openly, as “Barry Freed,” and wrote regularly for minor and mainstream publications under his real name. One piece of misdirection was his talking about his efforts against nuclear power (which he did oppose, later being arrested with Amy Carter at a protest or two) - but his real engagement was with the environmentally disastrous dredging of the St. Lawrence River (? IIRC) near where he lived. He was active in the opposition groups and well known as “Barry” - and was eventually recognized by a man who claimed he was going to turn him in, which led to his self-surrender.
The Playboy interview was genuine, and when it hit print, Hoffman freaked out, feeling that the author had broken the interview agreement and included far too many damaging and identifiable details about his location and life in hiding. IIRC, he was in the Southwest at the time, and instantly relocated to the Hudson River valley where he got involved in the above activities. Did the interview reveal too much? It’s hard to say, but even a careful reading knowing the facts behind it doesn’t really substantiate the belief. Hoffman was probably in a manic high at the time and overreacted. OTOH, his hyper-awareness helped kept him free, despite diligent hunters, until he gave up on his own terms, so it’s hard to second-guess.
Maybe not as such, but the Heinlein interview of 1969 is a curious case. He was interviewed at great length by Frank Robinson and the edited version was almost in press when the Manson murders occurred. There were tenuous links between the Heinleins and the Manson family members, and while they strenuously sought to distance themselves from those links, Hefner demanded that Robinson extend the interview to include specific questioning on the topic. Heinlein refused, and the interview lay in limbo until it finally appeared in Oui, a down-market from the mother(?) magazine, a couple of years later (1972?)
So interviews were subject to… pressure.
Yeah, right, we all read Playboy for the interviews.
that’s what you flipped to when people walked by.
I think Playboy’s relevance has fallen somewhere below small-town newspapers (and got in trouble for saying so, badly) but in the day - maybe 1965 through 1985? - the interviews were often ground-breaking, wall-shattering views into major figures’ minds and lives. Jimmy Carter, anyone? Even Abbie Hoffman, given the times? How many hundreds of other figures opened up, wide and raw, in an era before TMZ was rummaging through the digital trash cans of the world? I recall many of the interviews making mainstream headlines.
I never much cared for Playboy’s pictorials, anyway. Stuck in a late-50s (era, or reader age) notion of desirability.
Heh.
I suppose it’s way too late to add “not intended”…
I never read Playboy for the interviews either, but one, with Vladimir Nabokov, is superb and has been anthologized.
Was Abbie Hoffman seriously a manic-depressive?