THEATRE Royal play Boeing Boeing tells the story of a 1960s businessman who keeps his three air hostess girlfriends in a holding pattern until he can fit them in. But BRIAN BEACOM finds that the lives of air hostesses have been transformed in the last 45 years

KAREN CAHN was a 24-year-old tartan mini-skirted British Caledonian stewardess back in the 1980s. "Today, the plummy-voiced daughters of middle-class businessmen and professionals, girls with names like Pandora and Portia, go into PR," she says with a smile.

"But back in the Sixties, these expensively educated young ladies joined airlines such as BOAC (the British Overseas Airways Corporation), tempted by the prospect of exotic foreign travel and marrying a pilot.

"The airlines recruited them because it was posh people, mostly businessmen, who flew. And only posh girls (few men were recruited in those days) were deemed to be appropriate to look after their needs."

Karen, who attended fee-paying girls' school Craigholme, in Glasgow South Side, says that even in the 1980s, the Caledonian girls had to look sexy.

"And we seemed to spend a lot of time in training learning to walk up and down the aisle," she recalls with a wry grin.

"However, we all loved the job. Hostesses, you see, were minor celebrities, to the point that people even hung on your word. I'd be on the train to catch a flight and people would talk to me because I was in uniform."

Air travel was once an occasion. Men wore suits and women wore new frocks to fly. When they stepped onto the plane, they would be met by a glamorous air hostess in a tight-fitting uniform and a sexy film-star look. Early in her career, actress Julie Christie was on a plane and an air crew boss asked if she would like a job as a hostess. That was the sort of girls that international airline BOAC liked to recruit.

Not surprisingly, Ms Christie didn't fancy it. For those who did take to the skies, there was a price to pay. Hostesses were paid off when they hit 35. They couldn't be married. They certainly couldn't get pregnant. They weren't allowed to put on weight. And, believe it or not, they were often subject to underwear inspections.

Then everything changed. The 1970s saw the women finding their voice - and their taste for serious drinking. The arrival of the Pill, and the male air stewards who were now being recruited in larger numbers, meant the women shrugged off their demure image.

Flight crews, fuelled with vodka miniatures, and a drink called brown milk (Baileys, Cointreau and milk), found themselves on regular trips to Hedonism.

Robert Wilson, 35, from Clydebank, who currently crews for British Midland, said: "Most of the crew we flew with in the 1980s and 1990s got divorced and the job played a big part. People would have a fall-out at home, come away on a trip to Hong Kong or Singapore, get smashed during the three-day stopovers and have a fling. And this was the days before mobiles so girls didn't have to clock in at home with their husbands or boyfriends."

Tales of drunken binges aren't exaggerated, he says.

"It's been claimed bad behaviour was down to breathing recycled air, but that's probably not the case," says Robert, grinning. "It's more likely the girls who joined airlines were just up for a laugh.

"I can recall actually carrying girls up the steps of the plane because they were so drunk from the night before. They'd be put to bed in the bunks at the tail of the plane. Of course, that couldn't happen nowadays."

Karen, from Kilmacolm, who recently opened The Boutique @ 65 Virginia Street, agrees; "The job was about having fun. I recall a stewardess doing the safety announcement while one steward took his trousers down at the back of the plane to put her off. But when he tried to pull them up he fell, and yelled - and all the passengers turned round to see this naked man lay on the floor."

Cabin crew work in the 1970s and 1980s was still fairly glamorous but the 1990s saw airlines widen their recruitment policy.

Ryanair started up in 1985, easyJet arrived in 1995 and other budget airlines followed. As a result, the selection process went into freefall. The hostesses were no longer middle class and privately educated. The girls could have previously worked in a cafe or a call centre. And the treatment of passengers has changed, too.

"Headsets are thrown into laps these days," says Robert. "You're told to fasten your seatbelts by a female with the tone of a traffic cop and the face of a traffic cone."

And as for the air crew, they still have fun - but not so much, as stop-over times have been cut and alcohol policies introduced. There is no ageist policy on staff which is a positive thing, although one frequent flyer recently said that being greeted by three mature stewardesses was "like an episode from The Golden Girls".

"But it's still a fun job," says Robert. "Most people who work on airlines go into it for a couple of years, to see the world, have a laugh. And it's a hard job to give up because it's not hard work really.

"Yet, for the girls, it's certainly no longer glamorous."

One thing, though, is still the same.

"The girls still want to marry pilots," he says, smiling. "That's still the dream." Air time on the screen

AIR crew have been featured in a variety of TV series and films.

BBC Scotland comedy The High Life, starring Alan Cumming, took a camp overview of the world of local flight.

ITV released reality TV show Celeb Air last year, in which the likes of Steps star Lisa Scott-Lee and IT GIrl Tamara Beckwith competed to see who could become the top flight attendant.

Air crew films include Air Hostess, made in 1933 starred Evalyn Knapp and more recently Airplane, Leonardo DiCaprio's Catch Me If You Can, above, Flight Plan, Snakes On A Plane and View From The Top, starring Gwyneth Paltrow.