More than a ‘Lost Weekend’: John Lennon’s girlfriend displays intimate photos in NC shows

She was just 19 when she met John Lennon, but their love colored the rock legend’s final chapter, leading to what some call his most prolific time as an artist.

Lennon’s 18-month romance with May Pang — what he dubbed his “Lost Weekend” — included collaborations with Johnny Winter, Harry Nilsson, and Elton John on the single, “Whatever Gets You Through the Night.”

It produced a No. 1 album, “Walls and Bridges,” in addition to the classic, “Mind Games,” and a nod for co-writing the David Bowie hit “Fame.” Pang joined some songs, whispering the iconic “John,” on “#9 Dream,” and helped Lennon reconnect with Paul McCartney, who had sued him in 1970 when the Beatles split.

They made headlines for alcohol- and drug-fueled parties with Hollywood Vampires Nilsson, Keith Moon, Alice Cooper and Micky Dolenz, and for manic jam sessions, one that ended with record producer Phil Spector firing his pistol inches from Lennon’s ear.

But there were also sweeter times, relaxing by the water with friends and just living life with Pang and his son Julian Lennon.

A traveling exhibit, “The Lost Weekend: The Photography of May Pang,” will bring those lesser-known moments to Chapel Hill and Charlotte this month (details below).

Pang will host the three-day shows, meeting fans, answering questions, and signing prints that will be for sale.

She is telling her story now, because others who only experienced part of the story have told their versions for too long, Pang said. A documentary released last year, “The Lost Weekend: A Love Story,” is available on Amazon Prime and Apple TV.

After Lennon’s 1980 death, Pang married record producer Tony Visconti, raised two children, and built a music career as an executive for Island Records and United Artists. She stored the photos under her bed until a friend, Scott Segelbaum, convinced her to share them with the world, she told The News & Observer.

Among the rarest are one of Lennon with McCartney and the only photo of Lennon signing the contract to legally end the Beatles partnership on Dec. 29, 1974. She doesn’t have a favorite, Pang said, “because these are my kids.”

Segelbaum, who worked in radio for 20 years before turning to rock art and photos, said they have “been incredibly well received.”

“You’ve got to see the reactions of people when they come in there. It’s the combination of the emotions of seeing John in such a happy state and meeting May, who Beatles fans know was such a big, big force in his life,” Segelbaum said. “They get all emotional, and May will give them a hug.”

From personal assistant to lover

Pang fell into her role as personal assistant to John Lennon, then 32, and Yoko Ono, 39, after walking into a New York City office building in 1970 looking for a job.

The 19-year-old college dropout, who loved the Beatles, realized that their label, Apple Records, was there and bluffed her way into a job as a receptionist, despite being unable to type or answer the phones. She didn’t have anything to lose, Pang said.

“It was just whatever was presented to me. You took that opportunity, took the stuff that went along with it, and you say, OK, I’m going to do it, you know,” Pang said. “I used to say, I reach for the universe, but if you get the stars and the moon, you’re so far ahead.”

She met Lennon and Ono after being asked to help with two avant-garde film projects, “Up Your Legs” and “Fly.” Ono later asked that she stay on as their personal assistant, and she joined them in England, where she first met Lennon’s son Julian, and New York.

It was like working for two different people, Pang said of Lennon and Ono. It was a 24/7 job, and it wasn’t always easy.

In late 1972, Lennon disrupted a party at activist Jerry Rubin’s Greenwich Village apartment by having loud sex with another woman, embarrassing Ono in a blow to their already-rocky relationship. In 1973, Ono told Pang she should date Lennon.

She rejected the idea, Pang said, but Lennon pursued her, stealing a kiss one night in the elevator of the Dakota apartment building.

“He looked me in the eye. He whispered in my ear, and he kissed me, and before I knew it, John Lennon charmed the pants off me,” Pang says in the documentary.

Ono wasn’t sitting at home alone during their relationship that followed, Pang told The N&O. She wanted to see other people, too.

Music, love and wild times

Pang and Lennon flew to Los Angeles and spent time in Las Vegas, hanging out with friends and jamming in the studio, before moving in June 1974 to an apartment on New York’s East Side. Those were some of the busiest and happiest times for her, Pang said.

She found acceptance and support with Lennon that she didn’t experience as the daughter of a traditional Chinese father who preferred a son or as a first-generation, Chinese-American girl growing up in Spanish Harlem. They fell in love, she said.

“I didn’t like the way I looked. I didn’t like my Asian eyes, because I’d been made fun of in my neighborhood,” Pang said. “(John) looked at me, and he said, that’s the stuff I love about you.”

She credits her youth and the strength she learned from her mother for grounding her around famous people who acted recklessly at times, she said. Pang, who earned the nickname “Mother Superior,” abstained from alcohol and drugs.

“I had to take care of everybody, and Harry (Nilsson) and I fought, because there were times — and I loved the man, believe me, but he loved to party, and I would stop it somewhere along the line,” Pang said. “And John loved the idea that he knew I would step in, and he knew I’d take care of it, because I didn’t like it.”

Pang bristled when asked about a new book by Eliot Mintz, a former radio and TV personality and confidant to Lennon and Ono. In the book, Mintz claims Lennon was the most depressed he had been in his life with Pang and that he pleaded for reconciliation with Ono.

Pang said she read part of Mintz’s new book. “I just thought it was a laugh,” she said.

Mintz wasn’t there for most of the adventures, she said, while acknowledging a few high-profile incidents, including the time Lennon was thrown out of the Troubadour nightclub after a ruckus at a Smothers Brothers show.

“I’m not saying that John didn’t have drinks and hang out with friends, but the press has exploited the same couple of incidents over and over again. That makes it sound like you’re drunk the whole time,” Pang said.

“Meanwhile, we’ve forgotten all the other things that we’ve done, all the songs that he’s written, all the stuff that he appeared at … he wasn’t drunk during that time. We’re in the studio working. That’s why I said, people have no idea.”

Return to New York, and Yoko

Lennon sobered up after the Troubadour trouble, Pang said, and they moved back to New York, where Julian lived with them at times and friends, including Paul and Linda McCartney, Bowie and Mick Jagger, popped by.

Ono was still calling daily, as she had since they left, Pang said, and they would politely brush her off.

“I got to the point where I just said, Oh, hi, Yoko, and I’d just hand the phone over to John, because that’s what she wanted, and all he would say was, ‘You OK? Listen, I can’t talk right now.’ He’d hang up the phone, because there was nothing more to say,” Pang said.

They were making plans to buy a house together in Montauk in February 1975, when Lennon left home, saying he’d return for dinner and a trip to visit the McCartneys in New Orleans. Instead, he went home to Ono.

“She was hounding him so much that he just said, let me just get it over with,” Pang said, adding that Lennon also still faced the threat of deportation that dogged him in the 1970s.

She tried calling him, but Ono refused, Pang said. Still, they found ways to occasionally be together, and Lennon would call sometimes to talk, saying he was “trying to figure out how I can see you.”

“What do you say after that?” Pang said. “I said, things will work itself out, you know. ... I just wanted him to be OK.”

How to meet May Pang, see photos in NC

▪ Chapel Hill: Free showing at Higgins & Myers Fine Art Gallery, 1728 Fordham Blvd. (Ram’s Plaza). Hours are 4-8 p.m., Nov. 8; 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Nov. 9; and noon-4 p.m. Nov. 10.

▪ Charlotte: Free showing at Coffey & Thompson Gallery, 811 Providence Road. Hours are 4-8 p.m. Nov. 15; 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Nov. 16; and noon-4 p.m. Nov. 17.