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Authors: Jerry Oppenheimer
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Anna didn’t do drugs, even though marijuana, cocaine, LSD, and everything else one could snort, inhale, or shoot to get recreationally high was all around her, everywhere she went.
“Anna was always too much in control to be interested in drugs,” Lasky maintains. “She was
hideously
healthy” She says Anna didn’t even drink at the clubs, but nursed Coca-Colas, though she wouldn’t turn down Veuve Cliquot if offered by a gentleman.
Anna often went off to Dolly’s, on Jermyn Street, which drew a hip crowd of journalists and rockers, and she was a regular at the very exclusive London discotheque called Sibylla’s, on Swallow Street near Piccadilly Circus, which became known as the Beatles’ disco because George Harrison owned a small percentage of the place. The club’s private preopening night was unforgettable, with an elite boldface list of celebs: all of the Beatles, the Stones, Cathy McGowan, Julie Christie, Mary Quant, among other London fixtures. It was the kind of place where the owner felt it was successful only if you
couldn
’t get in, making it Anna’s kind of place, and she was there with Nigel Dempster for the premier.
“At fifteen, sixteen, Anna had this downtown London life,” Lasky says. “London was a hotbed of clubs, concerts, and endless parties. She went where it was fashionable to be seen and to see people. She didn’t need much sleep. She had enormous energy.
“She liked clubs and clubbing and dancing more than she liked the Beatles or the Stones. Anna didn’t go to rock concerts and didn’t go gaga over anyone in pop music.”
But Anna did once become mad for a sexy star in his late fifties, more her speed—the actor Laurence Olivier, whom she saw in Shakespeare’s
Henry V
at least a dozen times. While most girls Anna’s age were chasing Mick and Keith, she began pursuing Olivier. She often skipped school, bringing a satchel of clothing with her, changing out of her ugly North London Collegiate uniform and into something sexy in the ladies’ room of the underground station near the office building where Olivier had his production company. She’d stake out the lobby and wait for hours in hopes of meeting him. This went on sporadically for months, but she never was successful, and she finally gave up her quest.
Nothing seemed too risqué for sixteen-year-old Anna, who became delicious arm candy for Dempster, who once boasted that his nubile girlfriend’s breasts were “large” and “quite delectable.” When the London Playboy Cluband Casino, the five-story swingers’ paradise, had its star-studded opening night party, overseen by Woody Allen as a favor to Hugh Hefner, on July 1, 1966, Anna partied the night away with Dempster and hundreds of other sybarites, hedonists, and celebrities who had turned out for the festivities. As Vivienne Lasky notes wryly, “She’d go to the opening of an envelope.” In this case, though, it was a celebration of half-naked Bunnies spinning roulette wheels and turning cards for oil-rich Arabs, British playboys and their birds, and the usual turnout of Euro trash. The wild goings-on continued through the night at the Playmate Bar, in the disco, and at intimate gatherings in members’ rented private rooms.
An
Evening Standard
photographer was there to cover the event and shot photos of Anna shaking hands with pajama-clad Hugh Hefner. The next day a gloating photo editor showed the pictures to Anna’s father. “It did not go over well,” recalled Dempster.
Charles Wintour didn’t mind Anna having her independence, but he did mind her going out with Dempster. Brian Vine, a onetime New York bureau chief of the London
Daily Express
, saw Anna and Dempster together at the Playboy Club opening. A few days later, Dempster told him that Charles Wintour exploded when he called for his daughter at Phillimore Gardens.
“Nigel said Charles was very angry, so I think Nigel had to always hide the fact that they were seeing each other,”
Anna didn’t do drugs, even though marijuana, cocaine, LSD, and everything else one could snort, inhale, or shoot to get recreationally high was all around her, everywhere she went.
“Anna was always too much in control to be interested in drugs,” Lasky maintains. “She was
hideously
healthy” She says Anna didn’t even drink at the clubs, but nursed Coca-Colas, though she wouldn’t turn down Veuve Cliquot if offered by a gentleman.
Anna often went off to Dolly’s, on Jermyn Street, which drew a hip crowd of journalists and rockers, and she was a regular at the very exclusive London discotheque called Sibylla’s, on Swallow Street near Piccadilly Circus, which became known as the Beatles’ disco because George Harrison owned a small percentage of the place. The club’s private preopening night was unforgettable, with an elite boldface list of celebs: all of the Beatles, the Stones, Cathy McGowan, Julie Christie, Mary Quant, among other London fixtures. It was the kind of place where the owner felt it was successful only if you
couldn
’t get in, making it Anna’s kind of place, and she was there with Nigel Dempster for the premier.
“At fifteen, sixteen, Anna had this downtown London life,” Lasky says. “London was a hotbed of clubs, concerts, and endless parties. She went where it was fashionable to be seen and to see people. She didn’t need much sleep. She had enormous energy.
“She liked clubs and clubbing and dancing more than she liked the Beatles or the Stones. Anna didn’t go to rock concerts and didn’t go gaga over anyone in pop music.”
But Anna did once become mad for a sexy star in his late fifties, more her speed—the actor Laurence Olivier, whom she saw in Shakespeare’s
Henry V
at least a dozen times. While most girls Anna’s age were chasing Mick and Keith, she began pursuing Olivier. She often skipped school, bringing a satchel of clothing with her, changing out of her ugly North London Collegiate uniform and into something sexy in the ladies’ room of the underground station near the office building where Olivier had his production company. She’d stake out the lobby and wait for hours in hopes of meeting him. This went on sporadically for months, but she never was successful, and she finally gave up her quest.
Nothing seemed too risqué for sixteen-year-old Anna, who became delicious arm candy for Dempster, who once boasted that his nubile girlfriend’s breasts were “large” and “quite delectable.” When the London Playboy Cluband Casino, the five-story swingers’ paradise, had its star-studded opening night party, overseen by Woody Allen as a favor to Hugh Hefner, on July 1, 1966, Anna partied the night away with Dempster and hundreds of other sybarites, hedonists, and celebrities who had turned out for the festivities. As Vivienne Lasky notes wryly, “She’d go to the opening of an envelope.” In this case, though, it was a celebration of half-naked Bunnies spinning roulette wheels and turning cards for oil-rich Arabs, British playboys and their birds, and the usual turnout of Euro trash. The wild goings-on continued through the night at the Playmate Bar, in the disco, and at intimate gatherings in members’ rented private rooms.
An
Evening Standard
photographer was there to cover the event and shot photos of Anna shaking hands with pajama-clad Hugh Hefner. The next day a gloating photo editor showed the pictures to Anna’s father. “It did not go over well,” recalled Dempster.
Charles Wintour didn’t mind Anna having her independence, but he did mind her going out with Dempster. Brian Vine, a onetime New York bureau chief of the London
Daily Express
, saw Anna and Dempster together at the Playboy Club opening. A few days later, Dempster told him that Charles Wintour exploded when he called for his daughter at Phillimore Gardens.
“Nigel said Charles was very angry, so I think Nigel had to always hide the fact that they were seeing each other,”
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