It’s not unusual for a young girl to consider becoming a model one day. But it’s not very often that that interest leads to a topless appearance in October’s Big Ten issue of Playboy, or being voted the “Hottest Girl in the Big Ten.”
For one Northwestern sophomore, though, that’s exactly what happened. Maxine Christine (her chosen publishing name) is one of those typically over-involved Northwestern girls, active in Kappa Kappa Gamma, Boomshaka and Graffiti, while double-majoring in dance and Spanish.
It’s no surprise, then, that when Playboy started looking for Northwestern girls to model in their Big Ten issue, Christine missed it. “I never saw the fliers or anything,” she said. But after an article about the search was published in The Daily, Christine felt she had missed a chance. “I heard about it and people in my dorm were talking about it, and I thought, ‘Oh, I missed this!’ And I thought it would be so much fun to just give it a shot.”
Although Playboy was only in town for a day and a half after Christine found out about the auditions, she e-mailed them immediately, and within an hour, she was at the Hilton Garden Inn for her audition. After she was chosen, they did a photo shoot that week in a house in Evanston in which she posed in a library with Northwestern paraphernalia. She was nervous at first, but the photographer quickly made her feel comfortable. “It was kind of like the photographer, George Georgiou, and I were having a conversation through the lens while the other people in the room made sure everything looked just right,” Christine said of the experience.
Posing topless in Playboy, however, isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. Her roommate, McCormick sophomore Andrea Vonk, respects Christine’s choice, though she wouldn’t want to emulate it. “It’s nothing I personally would do,” Vonk said, “but if she’s comfortable with her body, more power to her.”
Christine, however, had no reservations. There were opportunities to pose clothed, as some Big Ten models did, but she did not know about that until after the spots had filled up. And while she said she didn’t feel comfortable modeling fully nude, going topless didn’t seem like a big deal to Christine. After all, “boobs are boobs,” she said.
For Christine, the opportunity was too much to give up. She had always wanted to be a model, but at 5′4″, felt she was too short for most opportunities. “I’m in the entertainment industry and I always say there’s no such thing as bad advertising unless they spell your name wrong,” Christine said, “and this was just another way to get my name out there. It was just a unique opportunity that I’ve never come across before.”
Christine said she has met only positive reactions after her appearance in Playboy. Her family supported her, she said, throughout the entire process, and her friends’ reactions have ranged from simple enthusiasm to insisting on introducing her to others as, “Guess what? This is Maxine, she’s in Playboy, and you have to go buy the issue!”
She has, in fact, become a bit of a celebrity on campus. Her roommate, Vonk, said she’d already heard of Christine before she met her, and mentioning her elicits interesting reactions. “I would be out or something, and someone would ask, ‘Who’s your roommate?,’” she said. “I’ll say, and half the frat guys will have Playboy and they’ll ask, ‘Which one is she?’”
It may be surprising that no one has responded to her negatively, but she and her friends insist that everything they’ve heard has been supportive. “I think everyone thinks it’s cool and gives her credit for being brave enough to do that,” Vonk said, “and I think we’re all glad that she’s representing Northwestern well because people think we’re the dorky school in the Big Ten and don’t have anyone attractive here.”
Her male friends say they feel the same way. Communication senior Jake Herbert, a friend of Maxine’s, explained, “Everyone thinks it’s sweet. Obviously, if she’s in Playboy, it’s not something frowned upon in the guy world.”
If she could go back and do it again, she insists that she would. For now, though, she’s content to stick with her dancing and studies. “I had an amazing time,” Christine said, “but now I focus on school. But it would be hard for me to turn down another opportunity from them, just because they made it so easy and it was just a really great time.”
Now, we admit we’re not the first to sit down with Maxine Christine and ask her a few questions, but rather than be like Playboy and ask about what she looks for in guys, what her favorite position is, or whether she’d be in a threesome, we thought we’d find out a little more about the personality behind the looks. Here’s what we discovered, in Maxine’s own handwriting:
