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It’s a fantasy that should be on every man’s bucket list. You’re on a business flight to Anywhere, USA, there’s not an empty seat in coach, and the obese stranger sitting in the middle chair, on your right side, keeps resting his sleepy head on your shoulder. All that’s preventing you from violently meeting the seat in front you forehead-first is the gorgeous stewardess who keeps smiling in your direction; with tight curves and come-hither eyes, she resembles a Victoria’s Secret model playing dress-up in airline worker attire. When it comes time for her to deliver your disgusting, but free, cheese sandwich platter, she also slips in a note, written in lipstick, that reads: “Bathroom…five minutes.”
That, our friends, is how one gets inducted into the "Mile High Club," the frequent flyers’ legend only experienced by a lucky few, yet dreamed about by anyone who racks up the miles. Will ABC’s promising new drama Pan Am touch upon the infamous club? It’s too early to tell, but a failure to do by the end of Season One would be an epic fail on the writers’ parts. Set in 1963, Pan Am (premiering this Sunday at 9 p.m. EST) follows the employees of said airline, led by Christina Ricci, as they cavort, fight, and get into all kinds of intriguing shenanigans.
The model that the show’s producers are hoping to emulate is that of Mad Men, and anyone who watches the AMC staple knows how often Don Draper gets it in, so to speak. So you’d think that the female lookers on Pan Am would, at some point in the series’ debut run, mess around in a plane’s lavatory. If not, we’ll at least have our made-up scenarios to enjoy, the ones where fictional stewardesses both new (i.e., Ricci, who’s looking better than ever) and old supply us with more than just flat soda and salty peanuts.
More specifically, we’re talking about The 15 Hottest Flight Attendants In Movies And TV. By list’s end, you’ll think turbulence is kinky.
Elizabeth Hurley
15. Elizabeth Hurley as Sabrina Ritchie in Passenger 57 (1992)
We should make one thing clear here, off the bat: In real life, smoking-hot flight attendants are more of a myth than a visible truth. For every one stewardess who serves free pretzels with a smile and hourglass curves, there are about six or seven ornery middle-aged women with shoulders like NFL linebackers.
With that perspective in mind, it’s easy to appreciate the Wesley Snipes-led, 1992 action flick Passenger 57 for its honesty. As Snipes’ character, a former cop, settles into his plane seat, he catches sight of an exceptionally gorgeous flight attendant, played by English dime Elizabeth Hurley back in her youthful prime. Whether Snipes is on the same page as us or not, Hurley’s presence leaves us saying aloud, “Since when do stewardesses look that hot?”
The instinct is ultimately spot-on. As it turns out, Hurley’ Sabrina Ritchie is actually a terrorist’s female muscle, posing as an airplane worker in order to kill the armed guards holding her evil boss captive. And put the almighty fear into the hearts of the airliner’s actual, below-average-looking female employees, no doubt.
Kirsten Dunst
14. Kirsten Dunst as Claire Colburn in Elizabethtown (2005)
As fans of Megan Fox know all too well, a woman’s hotness doesn’t automatically lead to great acting performances. Case in point: Kirsten Dunst in writer-director Cameron Crowe’s all-kinds-of-lame dramedy Elizabethtown. Far too wired, Dunst plays her character, a sharp-tongued flight attendant who romances a dreary shoe designer (played by Orlando Bloom), with the subdued calm of Looney Tunes mainstay Road Runner, bouncing around scenes manically alongside an unbearably flat Bloom.
But, in her typically naturalistic and adorable way, Dunst brings a distinctive cuteness to the film, which is sorely needed amidst Crowe’s direction-less plotting, unlikeable characters, and foolish insistence on selling Bloom as a leading man. Further good tidings are earned for Dunst when Claire, her Elizabethtown self, moves the coach-bound Bloom to first-class, no strings attached—even though he, along with Crowe’s film as a whole, should have been grounded with no foreseeable lift-off.
Margot Robbie
13. Margot Robbie as Laura in Pan Am (2011)
Early into Pan Am’s storyline, we see that Laura, played by blonde knockout Margot Robbie, is the stewardess team’s resident celebrity, a quiet and reluctant pin-up who’s been awarded the honor of gracing Time magazine’s cover. Being that Pan Am's period drama competition, NBC’s The Playboy Club, is steeped in Hugh Hefner’s legacy, there’s not a chance in Lucifer’s den that Laura will rip off the blue uniform and pose in the scantily clad, not fully nude (the show is set in 1963, remember), bunny book.
Besides, Laura has bigger issues to worry about than satiating male viewers’ collective thirst for old-school nakedness. Her sister, and fellow Pan Am flight attendant, Kate (Kelli Garner), is secretly working undercover for the United States government, a subplot that promises tons of intrigue, scandal, and, if Uncle Sam’s plans get botched, possible tragedy. As long as Laura doesn’t gain or lose excessive weight from the resulting stress, it’ll be all good on our end.
Asa Maynor
12. Asa Maynor as the Nameless Flight Attendant in The Twilight Zone episode “Nightmare At 20,000 Feet” (1963, CBS)
Written by the venerable Richard Matheson, “Nightmare At 20,000 Feet,” one of the more iconic entries into Rod Serling’s original Twilight Zone series, holds up today as the scariest airplane-set genre tale ever told. And what’s most impressive about the episode is that its creepiness and paranoid thrills aren’t diminished by the laughably cheap creature effects; the main antagonist, a furry gremlin that taunts a mentally disturbed, afraid-to-fly passenger (William Shatner) from the plane’s wing, looks like a fat dude wrapped in a patch of ratty, Kmart-brand carpet.
She’s not given much to do other than look pretty and repeatedly doubt Shatner’s seemingly nutty claims, but actress Asa Maynor sure does wear her flight attendant’s outfit quite well. In our mind, the villainous gremlin is actually misunderstood—the common perception is that it’s trying to crash the plane, but who’s to say that the beast isn’t peeking through Shatner’s window to ogle Maynor’s body? That theory is officially submitted for your approval—word to the late, and enormously great, Mr. Serling.
Britney Spears
11. Britney Spears in her “Toxic” music video (2004)
What, music videos did once appear on cable television? Back in 2004, few musical divas cranked up the sexiness in MTV-bound clips as well as Britney Spears, and her visual for the In The Zone single “Toxic” remains one of her all-time hottest.
In the Joseph Kahn-director video, Spears plays what’s best described as a Jane Bond character; her first order of spy business in Kahn’s directorial effort is to pretend she’s a flight attendant, a ploy designed to lure an equally in-disguise agent into the potty so she can obtain a special document. But the video’s 007 undertones are meaningless once you catch a glimpse of Spears’ cleavage-flaunting uniform, the kind of provocative costume that works better for slutty Halloween get-ups than actual airline service.
Karine Vanasse
10. Karine Vanasse as Colette in Pan Am (2011, ABC)
In a crew full of refined-looking stunners, Karine Vanasse, Pan Am’s wild card, is the most intriguing of the bunch. By the looks of it, she’s the ABC show’s equivalent to Christina Hendricks on AMC’s Mad Men: the sexy co-star who nabs scenes off the strength of her physical attributes and sneaks in memorable, character-driven scenes when her show’s marquee players fall back.
And similar to how we feel about Ms. Chesty Hendricks every week during Mad Men seasons, we’ve got our fingers crossed in hopes that Vanasse, a French-Canadian starlet making her American mainstream debut in Pan Am, doesn’t get the shaft in the writers’ room or the editing bay. The “shaft” in an airplane bathroom, though? Absolutely.
Erika Christensen
9. Erika Christensen as Fiona in Flightplan (2005)
Flightplan, directed by Robert Schwentke (who went on to helm last year’s geriatric action flick Red) is one of those films that makes us wish that Alfred Hitchcock were still alive and at the top of his movie-making game.
It’s custom-made for brilliant old Hitch: Jodie Foster plays a woman who falls asleep on a plane and discovers that her six-year-old daughter, who was seated right next to her when mommy started counting sheep, is missing. No one else on board knows anything, Foster’s character’s anxiety increases, and the plot’s tension builds up to what should be an extremely suspenseful climax; in the hands of Schwentke and screenwriter Billy Ray, though, Flightplan crash-lands into preposterous malarkey.
One thing Hitchcock always nailed was casting beautiful women in his movies—do the names Janet Leigh, Kim Novak, Eva Marie Saint, and Grace Kelly mean anything to you? If not, they damn well should. The closest that Flightplan comes to matching Hitch’s eye for hotness is in the casting of Erika Christensen as one of the plane’s flight attendants; it’s not the showiest role of the lot, but Christensen’s alluring eyes and shapely frame do right by Schwentke’s mostly wrong flick.
Christina Ricci
8. Christina Ricci as Maggie in Pan Am (2011, ABC)
It’s one thing to talk shit about joining the infamous “mile high club,” but to actually have a chance of doing so? That’s a rarity any man should cherish. And on ABC’s Pan Am, underrated beauty Christina Ricci (we were sprung well before Black Snake Moan) plays a flight attendant who’s a bit flirtatious.
The show’s sassiest female character, the pixie-cute actress’ character, Maggie, talks slickly back to men who spit rude game her way—it’s a role that harkens back to Ricci’s younger days as the no-nonsense, Goth teen Wednesday Addams in the 1991 TV-to-film adaptation The Addams Family. Except now, obviously, she’s of age, and reason enough alone for a self-respecting, heterosexual male to give Pan Am a fair shake.
Pam Grier
7. Pam Grier as Jackie Brown in Jackie Brown (1997)
Within Quentin Tarantino’s arsenal of vibrant genre films, the 1997, somewhat Blaxploitation-inspired Jackie Brown is the inimitable writer-director’s least heralded work. Shame on film historians, then, because Tarantino’s third film, following Reservoir Dogs (1992) and Pulp Fiction (1994), is no less effective today than it was 14 years ago.
Tarantino’s script, ripe with his signature time-jumps and snappy dialogue, is arguably his leanest one to date, giving its colorful characters streamlined objectives. For the title role, that of a flight attendant who smuggles drug money in from Mexico on her airplane rides, Tarantino proudly winked at his influences by resurrecting the career of '70s icon Pam Grier; 48 years old at the time of the film’s release, Grier looked every bit as fetching in Jackie Brown as she did in her Foxy Brown days—even more elegantly so, in fact.
Sunny Mabrey
6. Sunny Mabrey as Tiffany in Snakes On A Plane (2006)
It takes a special kind of woman to stand out in Snakes On A Plane. During the schlocky creature feature’s opening weekend back in August 2006, moviegoers with shut-off brains spent cash on tickets for two reasons: to watch CGI snakes kill a bunch of irritating, poorly developed human characters and to hear Samuel L. Jackson say his instant catchphrase, “Get these motherfuckin’ snakes off my motherfuckin’ plane!’”
Through her sheer hotness, Sunny Mabrey left an imprint on the minds of those who stupidly dropped hard-earned bucks to see the ultimately disappointing B-movie. Her character is expectedly one-note, intent on romancing a male passenger on her way to becoming snake chum. If there’s one thing that Snakes On A Plane gets right, however, it’s the classic horror movie rule of “Cast at least one sexy lady.” Mission accomplished.
Julie Hagerty
5. Julie Hagerty as Elaine Dickinson in Airplane! (1980)
For all of its silliness and comedic excellence, Airplane! has earned a reputation as a laugh machine that’s less about plot and more about ridiculous gags and quotable one-liners (“Don’t call me Shirley”). What’s left under-appreciated, though, is the script’s central love story, the narrative lynchpin from which all of the film’s outlandish satire begins.
Julie Hagerty plays an airline attendant whose ex-boyfriend climbs aboard one of her flights just to win her back, one jet-engine-powered mile at a time. And, no, the inflatable doll seen in the picture above isn’t her gentleman caller—that’s the “autopilot” responsible for landing the plane after the initial flyer gets sidelined by food poisoning in mid-air. Hey, we told you this shit is silly.
Halle Berry
4. Halle Berry as Jean in Executive Decision (1996)
Perhaps it’s because the name “Steven Seagal” appears in the credits, but director Stuart Baird’s 1996 adrenaline-pumping flick Executive Decision is rarely, if ever, mentioned in the pantheon of above-average action movies. An adrenaline-pumper is precisely what it is, though. One of Seagal's better efforts, Executive Decision is an anti-terrorist thrill ride that also stars Kurt Russell as an intelligence agent/doctor who bands together with a rag-tag squad of airplane riders to stop an Islamic evildoer.
By Executive Decision’s second half, Halle Berry emerges as Russell’s most trusted confidante, even helping him to land the carrier once they’ve defeated the bad guys. And she looks type-hot doing so with her short hair, vulnerability, and necessary toughness.
Zooey Deschanel
3. Zooey Deschanel as Anita in Almost Famous (2000)
Years spent working in Hollywood as everyone’s favorite indie darling turned mainstream co-star are paying off in spades for Zooey Deschanel. Premiering right after FOX’s Glee this past Tuesday night, her new sitcom New Girl was a ratings killer, debuting with Nielsen ratings figures well beyond any big-wigs craziest expectations. And we couldn’t be happier—with Deschanel as an adorably nerdy lead, New Girl is one of the fall TV season’s funniest newcomers.
Deschanel’s road to FOX success traces all the way back to 2000, when the then-unknown actress landed a part in writer-director Cameron Crowe’s magnificent rock 'n' roll dramedy Almost Famous. She plays the main character’s older, rebellious sister, a stubborn young woman who moves out due to their mother’s over-protective methods and domineering ideals.
In a way, the chance to see Deschanel’s implied nudity in the New Girl pilot’s opening scene was made possible by her flight attendant role in Almost Famous. Don’t see the connection? Clearly you’re mind isn’t in the gutter—no wonder why it’s so roomy down there.
Catherine Zeta-Jones
2. Catherine Zeta-Jones as Amelia Warren in The Terminal (2004)
Remember when Catherine Zeta-Jones was one of the hottest older women working in movies? Since 2005’s The Legend Of Zorro, the Welsh actress hasn’t done squat in Hollywood, a by-product of dealing with bi-polar disorder, and quite possibly her awful taste in scripts (we’re looking at you, screenplay for the 2007 romantic comedy No Reservations). Yet, even in her worst films, Mrs. Michael Douglas radiates with a certain Raquel Welch-like elegance, the kind of sexiness that’s more Glamour than Hustler.
In 2004, Zeta-Jones was at the top of her game, which explains why Steven Spielberg chose her to play the female lead in his quirky 2004 drama The Terminal. Tom Hanks stars as a foreigner who’s stuck inside of New York’s JFK airport, unable to enter the U.S. or return home because a revolution has broken out in his homeland, which is no longer recognized as a sovereign nation. Naturally, he makes several friends, the most attractive of which is Zeta-Jones’ kind-hearted flight attendant. Not the worst rock and a hard place to be stuck between.
Sofia Vergara
1. Sofia Vergara as Blanca in Soul Plane (2004)
Now that she’s a major player on ABC’s immensely popular, Emmy-dominating sitcom Modern Family, Sofia Vergara must sit through interviews with her fingers crossed outside of the camera’s sight. In her head, one thought stays on loop: “Please, lord, don’t let them ask about Soul Plane.” And can you blame her?
Every credibly successful actor has one or two cinematic skeletons in his or her proverbial closet, so Vergara needn’t worry. Yes, public humiliation could ensue from interviewers probing her (yikes!) about 2004’s big-screen detriment to anyone who cringes whenever they’re watching racially heinous films—you know, folks who fume over mentions of the name “Madea.” And, it’s true , her character in Soul Plane exists strictly to provide T&A. But when you look so amazingly sexy, as the Colombian beauty did in this horrid flick, you should feel pride, not resentment.
Vergara should look at it this way: Her Modern Family co-star, and recent Emmy winner, Julie Bowen once appeared in a movie called Amy’s Orgasm. There’s much more explaining to do with that one, don’t you think?