- Hugh Hefner: Well, I do think that she was an extraordinary person. And I feel some very obvious interconnections. She was born in 1926, the same year I was. She grew up influenced by the same pop culture and the same movies that had such an impact on me. I think that her dreams came from those impossible fantasies created by Hollywood. And being raised in my own case in a very conservative Midwestern Methodist home I escaped very early on into the dreams and fantasies of movies And I think that from her own, much more troubled childhood, I think the same thing was true and I think she escaped into those fantasies and then took on the role that she followed.