PAN AM: Fly the Friendly Skies with ABC’s Retro Sudser

ABC debuts their stylish drama Pan Am tonight, and it’s both a breath of fresh air and comfortingly familiar. Set in 1962, a period in American history that many view as the final days before the world went pear-shaped, Pan Am follows the lives and loves of men and women working for the airline.

Most of the headlines about the show have focused on the retro style, and rightly so. Today’s air travelers will feel a pang of envy watching the well-dressed passengers move freely about the luxurious cabin with nary a TSA pat down to impede them. The show does a terrific job of recreating not just the look but the excitement surrounding air travel for passengers and Pan Am employees alike.

Rather than depicting the stewardesses as “waitresses in the sky”, the young woman who earn the job are shown as awe-inspiring. They not only have jobs, giving them financial independence, but they travel and experience new people and places on a daily basis. It’s not a perfect life – we see the results of a naive affair, the less-than-glamorous apartments shared with many roommates, some sexist behavior – but it is an enviable one for the times, on the cusp of the women’s liberation movement.

The biggest name in the cast is Christina Ricci who plays Maggie, a Bohemian free-spirit whose personality is at odds with the conservative requirements of her job. Something of an instigator, her Maggie is a wild-card addition to the inaugural flight of the Majestic, flying from New York to London. Mike Vogel is piloting the plain, part of the young, hip image the airline is building. Kelli Garner and Margot Robbie play sisters from Connecticut who have lived a sheltered life before joining the fleet. Robbie plays Laura, a runaway bride who follows in her sister’s footsteps and accidentally becomes the face of Pan Am stewardesses.  Kate (Garner) leaves her East Coast world behind to travel the world as a stewardess, and by the end of the first episode has accepted an assignment as a CIA operative, a detail that turned this show from “pretty good” to “must watch” for me. That bit of historical accuracy opens up so many plotlines in addition to the “soap opera in the sky” set up, I’m ready to board this flight.

Pan Am premieres tonight at 8/7c on ABC. Tweet during the show using the #PanAm hash tag for a chance to win a nifty Pan Am flight bag. These were a hot item at Comic con this year; can’t wait to use mine as a carry on in a couple of weeks.