'I was EasyJet's most-hated staffer - Airline filming secrets viewers never got to see'
With her bright orange blouse and Victoria Beckham -style bob, not to mention her unique way of telling airport passengers it was THEIR fault they'd missed their flight, Easyjet operations manager Jane Boulton was a breakout star of late '90s hit TV show Airline.
And more than 20 years on from when ITV's fly-on-the-wall documentary series, which followed staff at the airline's Liverpool and Luton hubs, ended, fans are falling in love with the tough talking boss all over again thanks to social media.
The mum-of-three's quick wit is perfect for TikTok clips dubbed to dance music, with her memorable Airline catchphrases including 'It's easier if you get here on time', 'It's a plane not a bus' and the unforgettable 'A coffee shop is not departures' going viral thanks to a whole new generation of fans. Jane's quotes have been such a hit online she's selling mugs, bag tags and key rings with her catchphrases on - the merch with 'Txxxxr!' on, referring to the time she called a disgruntled passenger a very rude name as she walked away from him, is currently sold out - and recording messages on Cameo, the site that offers personalised videos from your favourite celebrities.
The most popular request she gets? Telling someone's loved one off for being late. The unstoppable reality TV show icon's next stop is an 'Audience With' tour of the country which starts in September and a self-published book on customer service and conflict resolution.
"It's absolutely gone mad," said Jane. "It's funny because about a year and a half ago one of my twins came home from school and said 'Oh my god Mum, everyone's talking about you'. I thought what have I done? but they said: 'No, they're watching you on TikTok'. I didn't have a TikTok account, I didn't know what they were talking about."
Married to husband Jon, 43, with daughters Olivia, 17 and twins Lauren and Alana, 15, Jane, who lives in South West London, is delighted when she's recognised in the street 'because I'm 54 now and I was 27 when the show aired'. "I have a huge gay following which I love," she said. "But the people who recognise me are a real mixed bag. When the show first came out I thought: 'They've made me look really awful and I'm not like that' but people were loving it.
"I never got anything negative, people used to say to me: 'Can you tell me I'm late for my flight?' They always wanted to come up and say hi, they didn't have mobile phones back then so it was just coming up and saying hello and asking for your autograph which we all found really weird."
Jane and her fellow cast members on Airline, who included Leanne Chung and Katrina Leeder, weren't paid for taking part in the show, which ran for 11 series and nine years. "Stelios (Haji-Ioannou, the founder of Easyjet) was a very clever man - he had a great head for knowing what worked and it was the best advertising campaign he could ever have," she said. "The airline grew so rapidly and Katrina and I have said, if it had been on now we would have been millionaires.
"Back then people didn't book their flights online, they did it through telephone calls and by the time the credits started rolling, the calls would come through in their millions to book. It was the best advertising campaign Stelios could ever have had."
Unforgettable scenes on Airline saw passengers try and bring prohibited items including live lobsters and a pet cat onto flights, famously mistake a coffee shop for a departures lounge and even fake funerals and honeymoons in a bid to get their flights held for them. Jane would step in to speak with passengers who had refused to accept the guidance of her staff, with one voiceover saying: "Susie has hoped to find a sympathetic ear. Instead she's found Jane Boulton".
"When you're working in customer service you cannot be sympathetic," said Jane of her no nonsense reputation. "You have to be empathetic, that's how we were trained. As far I was concerned, my staff were more than capable of doing a brilliant job and they didn't need someone to come in and take over.
"When I was an agent I used to find that quite demeaning so I used to try and hold back as much as possible. By the time I was called in they'd been told the same thing a few times and it did bug me and that's probably why I walked down like a stroppy old mare."
"Half the time if I'm honest, we sometimes pretended we were on the phone," Jane added with a chuckle. "There was no point ringing operations again because we'd already asked three times and they would have screamed at me."
The mum said she was affected by the difficult passengers she encountered. "For everyone that works at the airport, one of the things that happens is people miss flights and it's never a nice thing," she said. "There were times when a few of us used to go to the restroom, have a couple of tears, get it off our chest, put your lipstick back on and get back out there. I think that's why we used to drink so much at the time, we all used to go out afterwards and drink."
"Some people when they walk into an airport they lose all sensibility," she added. "I just think really? If you get there early enough you can drop your bags off, go have a nice glass of wine and get excited about your holiday and go. But that's obviously not as easy for everybody else."
Now a cake maker, Jane admitted she once nearly missed a flight herself with seconds to spare - she was travelling from Glasgow to Heathrow for work with Easyjet and had forgotten the airline had changed from their winter to summer timetable. "I would never have ever heard the end of it," she said.
And she revealed a secret softer side, saying: "I had a lady who missed their flight who wasn't on the TV, she was in her 80s. She missed her flight to Scotland and the next flight wasn't until ridiculously early in the morning so I took her back to my flat and she stayed with me. I looked after her and fed her and took her back to the airport the next morning. That's the real me."
The reality TV icon, who left the business in 2018 after climbing up the management ladder to head up Easyjet hubs at Newcastle, Liverpool and Glasgow, is proudest of inspiring countless others to enter the aviation industry she loves.
"I have at least 10 people a week message me saying that they're going into aviation because of me and I thought that's a great legacy, to me that is just so fantastic and fabulous," she said. "People tell me they got into customer service because of me every day too. I get at least five messages a day saying: 'I channel my inner Jane Bolton every day at work thanks to you' and I am secretly thinking: 'Please tell me you're not calling anyone a t****r, I just hope you're being professional'."
An Audience With Airline's Jane Boulton is touring the country from Thursday, September 18, with the opening gig at Bolton's Albert Halls. Visit janeboulton.co.uk to check in
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