PTC Asks NBC Affiliates Not To Air ‘Playboy Club'

The Parents Television Council says it has sent letters to every NBC affiliate asking the television stations not to air The Playboy Club, NBC's fall drama set against the backdrop of Hugh Hefner's famed Playboy Club in Chicago during the 1960s.

According to a copy of the letter obtained by Multichannel News, the organization's president, Tim Winter, told the stations that the show was putting a "veneer of sophistication" on the pornography industry. "I am writing to urge you, on behalf of the Parents Television Council's 1.3 million members, to preempt the program in your community," wrote Winter. He said individual members asking stations about the show had received what he called "canned responses" in support of "a sophisticated series about the transitional times of the early 1960s and the complex lives of a group of working-class women." Winter also warned stations that if they did air the show, PTC would be watching and would urge members to file complaints with the FCC if anything was indecent.