May Pang was set up with ex-Beatle John Lennon by Yoko Ono

Could Pang was nearly the Yoko Ono of Yoko Ono’s marriage.

The then-22-year-old was working as an assistant to Ono and John Lennon when, at Ono’s personal request, she reluctantly grew to become Lennon’s girlfriend in 1973.

As Pang remembers Ono placing it, “He wants somebody good, such as you.”

However Ono was possible not anticipating issues to go in addition to they did, or for Pang to nearly break up her marriage to the previous Beatle.

Trying again, Pang — a lifelong Beatles fan and topic of the brand new documentary “The Lost Weekend: A Love Story,” in theaters April 13 — advised The Publish, “It’s nearly surreal. In a technique, Yoko took benefit as a result of I used to be naïve. However she additionally gave me a present. John and I fell in love.”

Past the anticipated sexual liaisons, their time collectively included gunplay, stoned-out jam classes, Paul McCartney enjoying spy for Yoko, drunken carousing by way of the nightclubs of Hollywood, and at the least one home trashing.

It started in 1969 when 19-year-old Pang fluked right into a job as an workplace assistant for Apple Data, the Fab 4’s label.

“I requested if the Beatles ever come right here,” Pang, now 72 and residing in Queens, recalled. “[The office manager] simply chuckled and stated, ‘No.’”

However he was mistaken.

In 1970, Lennon and Ono relocated from London to New York and visited the workplace. “Apple’s VP stated to me, ‘Get your ass upstairs and see what they want,’” Pang recalled.

What they wanted was an assistant. Pang landed the gig.

It was heady work for a first-generation Chinese language American who grew up in Spanish Harlem and, beforehand, had gotten no nearer to rock stars than dancing to their information.

Early duties included procuring flies from restaurant dumpsters for Ono’s artwork movie “Fly.”

The footage captured actress Virginia Lust, allegedly sedated, as some 200 flies, proven one by one, exploring her physique.

However probably the most outrageous project got here from Ono in 1973.

It appeared like a typical morning within the couple’s Manhattan residence on the Dakota constructing when, Pang advised The Publish, “Yoko stated, ‘John and I’ve not been getting alongside. He’s going to begin going out with different folks. I believe you’ll be good for him.’”

Astonished, Pang protested. She didn’t wish to be the girlfriend of her married, 32-year-old boss. “Yoko stated, ‘You need to [do it].’ Then she walked out of the room,” Pang recalled.

She didn’t understand it on the time, however, she now believes, “Yoko wished me to be his girlfriend so she may management the connection.”

With neither Pang nor Lennon naturally , the organized romance began gradual.

After per week Lennon stole a kiss from her within the Dakota elevator. “Per week later, he obtained to second base,” she stated. “Days after, he hit a house run.”

As for the standard and frequency of the intercourse, she euphemistically says within the documentary, “It was cock-a-doodle-do on a regular basis … John Lennon charmed the pants off of me. After we made love [for the first time], I began to cry.”

Issues accelerated in September 1973. Early one afternoon, Lennon stated, “We’ve got to get out of New York, Could. Simply the 2 of us. Away from Yoko.”

By 6 p.m. that day, they had been en path to LA.

So started an 18-month-long affair that has come to be generally known as John Lennon’s Misplaced Weekend.

“We fell in love with one another,” stated Pang. “We had been like a few children. His favourite factor was to go to IHOP and eat blueberry pancakes.”

They moved right into a Bel-Air mansion, on mortgage from legendary document government Lou Adler (Carole King, the Mamas, and the Papas).

Life was idyllic.

Pang photographed Lennon regularly (an exhibit of her Misplaced Weekend period pictures runs April 8 and 9 at City Winery).

They wore one another’s clothes and rubbed elbows with LA royals comparable to Warren Beatty, Cher, and Elizabeth Taylor.

For Pang’s twenty third birthday, in October 1973, Lennon purchased her an orange Plymouth Barracuda.

He drew photos that confirmed her dashing, as he sat within the backseat, screaming, “Assist.”

However there was additionally a wild facet. Unbound from Ono’s smart restraints, Lennon hit Tinseltown arduous — and never at all times to one of the best impact.

“It was a rehash of my youth,” Lennon as soon as stated. “Performing like a teen in Hollywood.”

On one event, he drunkenly turned up at a scorching LA nightclub referred to as the Troubadour with a tampon tied round his head.

In response to the Guardian, he proceeded to “make a supreme fuss on the ticket counter” for comped drinks — and stiffed the waitress who referred to as him “some jerk with a Kotex round his head.”

One other night time on the Troubador, issues obtained wild when Lennon and his buddies had been smashed on Brandy Alexanders.

“It was a comeback present for the Smothers Brothers [a comedy duo canceled by CBS due to off-color humor],” recalled Pang, who didn’t drink alcohol. “We had been at a desk with Pam Grier, Peter Lawford, and Harry Nilson [a hell-raising musician whose 1974 “Pussy Cats” album Lennon produced].

“Harry heckled the Smothers Brothers and obtained John to affix in. Unexpectedly, the Smothers’ supervisor came visiting and grabbed John by the collar. John didn’t prefer it and the desk went flying.”

Lennon and Nilson had been proven the door.

Previous to the dust-up, Lennon showily made out with Pang.

Photographers had a discipline day.

Again in New York, Ono was protecting tabs on the connection.

“She’d name 20 instances a day,” stated Pang. “Generally it might be at 4 a.m. And the calls had been over nothing. She would say, ‘I simply went for a stroll.’ I might say, ‘And?’ However there could be no and.”

In response to the doc, Ono even had a hand in a shock reunion between Paul McCartney and Lennon in LA.

“John was not responding as Yoko wished,” stated Pang, which means that she hoped Lennon would tire of Pang and return to her. “She referred to as on Paul to see what was taking place with us. She advised Paul, ‘Oh, I don’t thoughts John coming dwelling.’ John by no means knew, however Yoko despatched Paul to verify us out.”

Whereas life in LA was not all play — Lennon recorded his album “Rock ‘n’ Roll” throughout this era, with infamous producer Phil Spector — even efforts to work skidded off the rails.

“Phil appreciated poppers,” Pang recalled, referencing capsules of alkyl nitrate that had been snapped open and induced a fast excessive through inhalation of the fumes. “And he popped them beneath everybody’s nostril. He was a nightmare.”

Pang advised The Publish that the craziest Spector session ended with him taking pictures a gun within the studio lounge whereas chatting with Lennon.

“Everyone hit the bottom; I ran towards the gunshot,” stated Pang. “I entered the lounge and heard John say, ‘If you happen to’re going to shoot me, shoot me. However don’t f–okay with my ears. I want them.’”

That night time, again at Adler’s home, following a drunken scuffle with Spector and Spector’s bodyguard, a vodka-blasted Lennon flipped.

“He threw a chair by way of the window and broke a gold document,” stated Pang. “The subsequent morning, John advised me that they took his glasses and tied him up with Lou’s neckties. He didn’t know his whereabouts. Phil’s bodyguard sat on him. John thought there was going to be an all-male ménage à trois.”

After about six months in LA, the couple returned to New York — however to not Ono, Pang stated.

“John was with me. We moved right into a one-bedroom residence on East 52^nd Road. It’s the place Bob Gruen shot the well-known photograph of John on the roof, sporting a T-shirt that stated ‘New York Metropolis.’ I took a photograph of Bob taking the photograph,” she remembered

They lived as an unabashed couple and Lennon, in line with Pang, made his choice for her clear.

At an off-Broadway premiere of a musical based mostly on “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Membership Band.” Ono turned up and Pang recalled that she “whispered to John, ‘Would you like me to surrender my seat?’ He bluntly stated, ‘No! Let her sit within the again.’”

Then issues grew to become critical: “In January 1975, after visiting Mick [Jagger] and Bianca [Jagger] at Andy Warhol’s home in Montauk, we discovered a home to purchase there. I believe Yoko obtained wind of how shut we grew to become. If we purchased the home, it might have been the tip.”

Later that month, on a Friday night time, Lennon went to the Dakota.

Ono had arrange an appointment with a hypnotist, ostensibly to assist him give up smoking.

“He headed it for the door and I knew it was not good,” stated Pang, including that Lennon promised to return again however spent the weekend with Ono. Once they reconvened on Monday, Pang stated, “John advised me, ‘Yoko is permitting me to return again.’ I requested whose concept it was. He stated ‘No one’s.’ That was the tip. It hit me arduous.”

Pang quickly ceased working for Lennon and Ono and secured a job at Island Data. Nonetheless, over the subsequent 5 years, there have been telephone conversations and sexual intimacies between her and Lennon.

“Calls could be sudden,” stated Pang. “The final one was on Memorial Day Weekend 1980. He referred to as from Cape City and stated, ‘We’ve got to discover a manner for us to get collectively.’”

Some six months later, Lennon was fatally shot by Mark David Chapman in entrance of the Dakota.

“I used to be at a pal’s home and heard on the radio that John was shot,” Pang stated. “I went chilly and referred to as a pal to verify I heard it accurately. I subsequent heard that he was lifeless. I dropped the telephone and screamed. I later spent lots of time crying on my own and spoke with him spiritually. I’d say, ‘I can’t consider you’re not right here.’ We by no means had closure, and I don’t have closure to at the present time.”

Although Pang has principally been out of contact with Ono because the Misplaced Weekend, she heard from a mutual pal, the late ’60s radical Jerry Rubin, how Ono actually felt about her backfired plan.

“Jerry advised me Yoko was stunned my relationship with John lasted greater than two weeks,” stated Pang, who has two youngsters along with her former husband, music producer Tony Visconti. “Her plan was for it to actually be a misplaced weekend. However it wasn’t that. She didn’t count on us to fall in love.”