When Ms. Rau — who has appeared in American Vogue, Italian Vogue and a Balmain campaign, among others — heard that she would be a Playmate, she cried from happiness, she said on Thursday. “I’ve seen a lot of hateful comments,” Ms. Rau said. Some commenters on social media insisted that Hugh Hefner would never have allowed a transgender woman to appear in his magazine. The May 2014 issue came with a special section called Playboy A-Z that featured Ms. Rau fully nude for a spread titled Evolution. She was outed shortly afterward by a British tabloid, but returned to the pages of Playboy in 1991 for a solo pictorial, a first for a transgender woman.

Source: New York Times October 20, 2017 00:49 UTC