Kate Upton on posing for Playboy: ‘I never like to say never’

Kate Upton said yes to the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue cover in 2012 and 2013. But if Playboy magazine ever came calling to make her its cover girl, Upton wouldn’t be so quick to don bunny ears.

“I never like to say never,” the blond bombshell said recently, “because there are circumstances that I could do pretty much anything if it inspires me and if I think that it’s cool at the time.”

Thanks to British GQ, by the way, for posing that question.

“But right now, at this point in my career,” she told the magazine, “I’m not doing Playboy.”

Now, the world has already seen the model nearly nude -- not to mention in motion.

In Terry Richardson’s 2012 cat-daddy video, wearing an itsy-bitsy bikini, Upton bounced to, er, broke down the cat-daddy dance move, made popular by the group the Rej3ctz and Chris Brown. The clip sparked so much controversy that YouTube took it down, then restored it for the curious the very next day.

Technically she went half-dressed in her first Sports Illustrated swimsuit shoot, back in 2011: Her top was clad only in masterful body paint. She repeated the body-paint thing for the magazine again in 2014.

Plus, well, Upton’s done the topless thing -- always playing coy, but still topless -- many, many times, for Contributor, Muse, Cosmopolitan, Vogue Germany and GQ. And for the aforementioned Richardson.

Still, as far as Playboy goes? Looks like Hugh Hefner will have to keep dreaming.