The Playboy Club

It's the early '60s, and the legendary Playboy Club in Chicago is the door to all your fantasies... and the key is the most sought-after status symbol of its time.

The Playboy Club (2011) is a US period drama created by Chad Hodge for NBC. Set in early 1960s Chicago, the series follows the glamorous, risky world of the legendary Playboy Club, where the key to the door is the most sought-after status symbol of its time. Eddie Cibrian plays Nick Dalton, a figure tied to the club's power structure, while Laura Benanti, Amber Heard, Jenna Dewan, Naturi Naughton and Leah Renee play the club's bunnies, each navigating ambition, romance and the constraints of an era that limited women's choices. Jenifer Lewis and David Krumholtz add texture as Pearl and Billy Rosen. Each episode moves through backroom deals, nightclub performances and the threat of mob interests hovering over the club's glossy floor. The series runs three episodes of forty-five minutes and was canceled after its single season. Its tone is sleek and sultry, mixing seductive surfaces with a current of unease and social pressure. Fans of Mad Men, Pan Am and The Gilded Age will find resonance in its period styling, its portrait of constrained women chasing power, and its atmosphere of polished fantasy masking real stakes.

Audience reception was negative, with viewers finding the 1960s Playboy Club drama thin and unconvincing across its short run.

• Mad Menshared period glamour, 1960s workplace drama, mob-tinged nightlife intrigue
• Pan Amshared retro nightclub setting and ensemble of women navigating a glamorous male-run institution
• The Gilded Ageshared 1960s-era glamour, ambition and dark undercurrents of a rigid social world

Created by

Chad Hodge

Release Date

2011-09-19

Episode runtime

45 min

Rating

6.2 / 10 (52)

What is The Playboy Club about?

A 1960s Chicago nightclub becomes the setting for glamour, ambition and danger among its waitresses and the men who run the place.

What is The Playboy Club like to watch?

Ember's analysis rates the pacing of The Playboy Club as brisk, its intensity as moderate and its storytelling as simple.

Is The Playboy Club violent?

Only mildly. Ember rates the violence in The Playboy Club as mild.

What did critics think of The Playboy Club?

Audience reception was negative, with viewers finding the 1960s Playboy Club drama thin and unconvincing across its short run.

Which shows are like The Playboy Club?

Shows with a similar feel include Mad Men, Pan Am, and The Gilded Age.

How long is The Playboy Club?

The Playboy Club: 1 season, 3 episodes.

Is The Playboy Club still running?

No, The Playboy Club was canceled.