E-Mail This Article to a Friend BUNNY FATIGUE There’s very little in the way of sex at Playboy’s 50th-anniversary bash BY CHRIS WRIGHT

FOR SOMEONE REPUTED to host the most fabulous parties in America, Hugh Hefner is not much of a dancer. Hefner — or Hef, as his four billion closest friends call him — was on TV recently, grooving at one of his fabled Playboy Mansion shindigs, swatting his twiggy arms in front of his face as if protecting himself from a cannonade of invisible dodge balls. What was truly odd about the footage, though, was that the statuesque lovelies surrounding Hef regarded his Saint Vitus’ dance with expressions of awed appreciation. "Look at those moves!" the faces seemed to say.

There is a similar dynamic at work with Hef’s Bunnies. There can be few things more ridiculous-looking than a grown woman with a fluffy tail tacked to her ass and a pair of floppy ears on her head. Yet people rarely mention this. The thing is, when we look at Hef or one of his Bunnies, we do not see them for what they are — a gangly 78-year-old man, a stupidly dressed woman. We are too dazzled by the Brand. Which may explain the throngs of people who show up at Avalon on a Wednesday night for the Boston leg of Playboy’s 50th Anniversary Club Tour. Tickets for the event are $65 and $146, which is an awful lot of club money, but no one seems to mind. This is Playboy. It has to be good.

No, it doesn’t.

Let’s start with the security personnel. You’ve seen these guys before: stern faces, dark suits, squiggly wires leading from collar to ear, talking into their cuffs like the Junior Secret Service — the kind of guys who make the word "Sir!" sound like "Asshole!" Outside the club, a man lights a cigarette. "Sir!" Who, me? "You cannot smoke out here!" I can’t smoke in the street? Mumble-mumble into the sleeve, the stern face getting sterner. You half expect a helicopter to appear, an anti-smoking squad to rappel onto the red carpet. "Sir!" Not exactly the "Hef-style" treatment we’ve been promised.

But we’ve been promised many things — the opportunity to "experience the heyday of the swinging Playboy Clubs firsthand," for one. To give the place a heyday feel (difficult to do, granted, with OutKast blaring on the dance floor), the Playboy people have decked Avalon with memorabilia: Bunny rugs, Bunny chairs, "historic photographs." The most ballyhooed item on display tonight is Hugh Hefner’s actual bed. Large, round, and with a brown, nylon-fluffy bedspread, it’s possibly the ugliest piece of furniture in the world. Again, though, that doesn’t matter. It’s Hef’s bed. It’s great.

In any event, Playboy seems to have had little trouble flogging tickets for the affair — even the $146 ones. By 7 p.m., when the VIP portion of the evening starts, there is a steady flow of people running the security-guy gauntlet. "We’re bad," say two strutting, middle-aged guys. "We’re bad." For their money, the VIPs get "a VIP laminate," "an exclusive VIP gift bag," and six VIP drink tickets. The biggest draw for the VIP crowd, though, is the opportunity to mingle with 10 bunnied-up Playmates before the stampeding masses arrive. In the lobby, a VIP looks at a drink ticket and says, "Is this good for one lap dance?" He is way off base.

Along with the blazered money managers, the shirtsleeved liquor distributors, the dolled-up girly-girls, and the smattering of trendies here tonight is a larger, altogether more important constituency: people who might be described as Hefheads. These guys aren’t here for a cheap thrill — or they are, but the thrill has very little to do with sex. In effect, this is a comic-book convention, except that rather than scoring a rare edition of The Green Lantern, you get to go home with a picture of you cozying up beside Miss April (thumbs up!). For many of the attendees, the Playmates aren’t women so much as they are collectibles.

One long-haired, broad-girthed Hefhead says he’s been to hundreds of these "glamour-girl trade shows." Another, this one in his 60s, spends the night trailing the Bunnies, a copy of Playboy and a clipboard under his arm, checking the names off as they sign the cover. "I went to one of these in Richmond," he explains, "and I kept losing track of who was who." The most popular signing spot is in front of Hugh Hefner’s actual bed. The girls stand here with their strained smiles and perfect breasts, wincing at the endlessly flickering flashbulbs.

At the other end of the club, a curvaceous woman named Catherine Delish takes the stage to honky-tonk strip music. The guys form a tight, whooping knot in front of her. The gloves come off. "Whoooo!" The stockings. "Yeah!" The bustier. "Aargh!" Then ... well, that’s it, really. There’s some fancy work with a pair of feather fans, a G-string, a skimpy bra. The nostalgia of the act seems lost on many in the audience, who have become accustomed to performing gynecological exams on their strippers, and the applause is fairly muted. "Don’t forget to visit the Playboy store!" blares a voice over the PA, and the guys drift away for more signing, more posing.

As the night wears on, the music gets so loud it makes your pants shake. Hef, of course, isn’t here tonight, but if he were, he might take his place on the packed dance floor. "It’s like any other night at Avalon," says a young man named James, rolling his eyes. "The bartenders are just as attractive as the Playmates." James is the reason Playboy holds events like this. Brand fatigue. An entire generation of boys growing up to think that Hugh Hefner dances funny.