Spanky and Our Gang
From Lillian Roxon’s article in Eye:
Those people arguing with the desk clerk who won’t let them go up are not on their way to see a fashion buyer from Idaho. They were invited to dinner up there by Spanky. In the end, in desperation, Spanky and her guests sit in the nonlobby on that hard little bench eating the artichoke hearts she has considerately brought down from her room with her.
(Listen, by then Spanky had a record in the top 10, but with a nice lack of snobbishness, the Albert doesn’t play favorites with its freaks.)…
Spanky liked the Albert because there were parties every night, and because it was within walking distance of the Bitter End where she was singing, so she saved on cab fares. But, of course, it was another thing when all these teenybopper magazine kids came up there to interview her after “Sunday” made it on the charts, and found her using saucepan lids for ashtrays because this is one commodity, in addition to others, the management does not provide.
“You should have seen their faces. They weren’t ready for the Albert, those kids.” She chuckles at the memory.