Real Housewives’ of NY star Kelly Bensimon joins a long line of women hoping to increase their profiles with a nude spread in Playboy. The 41 year-old mother of two graces the March cover draped in red satin. She was photographed by her ex husband, fashion photographer Gilles Bensimon, and goes topless but doesn’t reveal her nether regions according to advance reports. Bensimon will appear in a six page spread in the upcoming issue, the cover of which has just been released. Here’s an interview she did with E! explaining her decision:

So if you’re not an exhibitionist, why did you do it?
When my agent was like, “Would you be interested in doing this?” at first I was like, “Uh, I don’t think so.” But then I was like, “That would be amazing.” I’m 41. It’s a great image for the rest of the world. Yes, you can have it all. You can have two kids, you can be in shape and you can really enjoy life.

Whose idea was it to have your ex-husband [legendary fashion photographer Gilles Bensimon] shoot it?
That was my idea. No one takes more beautiful pictures of women than Gilles. I know a lot of amazing photographers, and they’re all lovely and awesome, but Gilles makes women better versions of themselves, and that’s what I wanted for Playboy.

What do your daughters think?
They really love that their mommy and daddy are working together. We talked about it. Some of it was filmed for the show.

I’ve seen some of the photos, but not all of them. Do any actually show you south of the border?
I didn’t want to do that. I don’t think that part of a woman’s body is really evocative. The roundness of the hips, the buttocks, the breast, the shoulders, the clavicle, the hair, the teeth—those are things that I think are most evocative and provocative parts of the body. So I don’t think it’s really necessary to show that. Some people might think it’s necessary, but it wasn’t for me.

There’s been some speculation that you did Playboy to try to one-up Bethenny on her “I’d Rather Go Naked” ad for PETA. Any truth to that?
No! Different opportunities come to different people. That’s not me. I don’t play that game.

[From E! Online]

I’ve seen stomach-baring photos of Bensimon exercising outside for the paparazzi, and she’s even run in traffic in New York. I doubt that she’s not an exhibitionist.

What is up with her belly button on the cover? It’s way over to the side. She could possibly be twisting her torso like that, but it really looks like they Photoshopped her belly button too far over. Why didn’t someone catch that before this went to press?

Are these covers with sort-of recognizable pseudo celebrities, like Tara Reid, Heidi Montag and Aubrey O’Day, decent sellers for Playboy? I tried to find out more about this, but it’s hard to get circulation numbers for specific issues. There is news that Playboy cut circulation 38% due to declining sales last fall. Maybe this strategy isn’t working out so well for them. Hugh Hefner is also getting sued by a shareholder for helping contribute to the decreased value of Playboy stock by making bad business decisions.

One photo below from Bensimon’s Twitpic. The other photo is from Playboy via E! Online