Lola's mother also was born in Ohio but her father was a native of North Dakota, who in 1930 supported the family by working as an inspector in a local insulating business.

[6] Albright made her motion-picture debut with a small singing role in the 1947 musical comedy The Unfinished Dance, and then appeared the following year in two Judy Garland movies: The Pirate and Easter Parade.

She first gained studio and public notice in the 1949 film noir production Champion with her portrayal of the wife of a manipulative boxing manager; she falls for a prizefighter played by Kirk Douglas.

[8] In 1961, she starred in Alexander Singer's A Cold Wind in August – a low-budget, black-and-white, independent film – as a divorced burlesque show stripper in her 30s who becomes involved in a torrid romance with a 17-year-old boy.

"[11] Her performance in A Cold Wind in August gave fresh impetus to her film career, leading to roles in Elvis Presley's musical Kid Galahad in 1962, in which she played the hard-boiled, long-time girlfriend of a cynical boxing manager played by Gig Young, and in French director René Clément's Joy House as a wealthy widow with a passion for handing out meals to the poor (albeit with an ulterior motive).

In Lord Love a Duck (1966) she portrayed a cocktail waitress who turns suicidal when she thinks she has ruined her daughter Tuesday Weld's life.

She gave up her feature-film career in 1968 after completing her work in The Impossible Years, a generation-gap farce in which she performed as Alice Kingsley, the despairing wife of a professor of psychiatry played by David Niven and the mother of two teenaged daughters.

[3] Later she had a recurring role on The Bob Cummings Show in the 1950s, and made guest appearances on television series such as Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Tales of Tomorrow (episode - All the Time in the World)The Thin Man, Gunsmoke, Rawhide, Laredo, Burke's Law, The Dick Van Dyke Show, My Three Sons, The Beverly Hillbillies, Bonanza (two episodes, including S6 E21 "The Search" 1965), The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Medical Center, Kojak, Columbo, McMillan & Wife, Quincy, M.E., Starsky & Hutch, The Incredible Hulk, and Branded.

When actress Dorothy Malone had to undergo emergency surgery, Albright filled in for her as the character Constance MacKenzie on the primetime soap opera Peyton Place.

[5][13] Albright's subsequent role on Peter Gunn and her performances singing on that series led directly to her second album, Dreamsville (1959), which was arranged by Henry Mancini and featured his orchestra.