
The October print deadline was looming, and we’d have to find another Playmate soon. Eventually, we just gave up and called it quits for the day. We couldn’t get her to relax, even after Slava, the bald and gregarious Playboy photographer, gave her a hit of his joint. She squirmed and pouted in front of the camera and sometimes even frowned. Her olive skin was oiled and shining beautifully under the studio lights, but her poses were stiff and unnatural. Sofia was a perfect Playboy bunny, except for one rather crucial detail: She wasn’t photogenic. Sofia was a tall and gorgeous blonde with jade green eyes and a sensual figure that perfectly matched Hugh Hefner’s idealized 36-24-36 hourglass body type. We’d been struggling all morning to photograph voluptuous Sofia, our top choice for October’s “Playmate of the Month,” but the pose wouldn’t come out right. It was getting hot and sweaty from all the bright lights in the photo studio downstairs at the central Moscow offices of Playboy, and it wasn’t even lunchtime yet.

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