Still Red Hot

Beautiful, compelling, flirtatious – this is what typifies the Virgin Atlantic gal, according to two recent adverts on British television.

One is shot in black-and-white, and features a lone burlesque dancer, strategically waving around red placards announcing reduced prices of flights on Virgin Atlantic. She grins inanely to that ubiquitous show melody, the name of which I would challenge you to remember, but which screams ‘STRIP! STRIP! STRIP!’

The second is an 80s nostalgia-trip in which a fleet of red-uniformed Virgin Atlantic air stewardesses stride confidently through an airport terminal led by their male pilot (naturally). We are led down memory lane or, rather, duty-free as the camera scans over awe-struck men in Our Price and Wimpy. A crowd of paparazzi photographers rushes over to the Virgin Atlantic airline crew, as an abandoned Madonna-circa-Desperately Seeking Susan watches after them jealously.



The cultural references are a deliberate celebration of Virgin Atlantic’s longevity, with the second advert proudly announcing the company’s twenty-five year anniversary. However, this harking back to the past unwittingly serves to resurrect the sexual politics of that era. Power-dressing, for example, apparently signified a form of emancipation, but always within the feminised sphere of fashion and shopping. Power-‘undressing’, in the case of Virgin Atlantic’s burlesque dancer, once again repackages erotic dancing, a pleasure traditionally associated with male audiences, as empowering for women. The fact is that when everything is stripped (ahem) away, it’s still taking one clothes off for another paying person’s pleasure.

For more on Virgin Atlantic’s use of women in advertising, see this brilliant article by Stuart Jeffries.