By JO KNOWSLEY in Sydney
Last updated at 21:12pm on 17th February 2007
Qantas stewardess tells how she fell for Hollywood star in Seat 2K...and how after a mad, passionate fling he abandoned her to face the sack...
The attraction had been immediate and overwhelming from the moment they first made eye contact.
But as Qantas stewardess Lisa Robertson leaned over towards Hollywood star Ralph Fiennes to offer him a drink, she could not have imagined how the evening would unfold - or that she would end up in a passionate tryst with him in the aircraft lavatory.
When rumours first emerged that Ralph Fiennes joined the Five Mile High Club in the business-class lavatory on flight QF123 from Darwin to Bombay, Qantas issued a statement from Lisa vigorously denying the allegation.
But The Mail on Sunday can now reveal the truth about what happened that night - how the English actor had unsafe sex with the 38-year-old Australian stewardess on the flight and went on to seduce her in an evening of almost non-stop love-making at his lavish hotel in India.
Speaking for the first time, exclusively to The Mail on Sunday, Lisa, a former high-flying police officer, said: 'It's true. We did make love on the plane that night. At first I denied it because I was so desperate to keep my job and I didn't want to hurt Ralph.
'I know some people will think it's disgusting. And I'm not proud of what I did - it was inappropriate behaviour. But I don't regret it. Ralph is gorgeous and the chemistry between us was amazing. What woman wouldn't want to make love with him? This sort of attraction happens to people all the time. It's just not usually with a Hollywood star at 35,000 feet.
Although Lisa makes no bones about having been an enthusiastic participant in the unedifying episode and is clearly still thrilled to have attracted the attention of an international film star, it is hard not to see her also as his victim.
Despite her tall, trim figure, there is sadness in her eyes, highlighted by the medication she takes for depression since she left a tough front-line job as a detective with an elite New South Wales police drugs squad.
One can't help asking whether Ralph Fiennes didn't spot a vulnerable woman, use her, and then abandon her to face the sack from her job with Qantas.
Lisa recognised the 44-year-old star of films including The English Patient from the minute she went to his window seat 2K to offer him a selection of champagne, orange juice and water.
And she admits she was star-struck. He was dressed casually in beige chinos and a long-sleeved shirt, and as he quietly asked for a glass of water she gushed: 'Oh my God, it's you. I am such a fan of your films. I love your work. I've seen The English Patient 20 times.' She recapt
ured her composure and added: 'I'm so sorry. This is so unprofessional of me.'
Fiennes, however, looked relaxed and amused.
'He leaned forward, gazed deep into my eyes and stroked my arm as if to reassure me,' said Lisa. 'He whispered, 'It's OK. Anyway, I think you're gorgeous.'
She admits: 'I felt overwhelmed. I felt like you do when you're a teenager. My heart was pumping with excitement. We kept looking at each other and giggling. He was just so gorgeous. I noticed he had lovely soft skin, beautiful hands and wonderful eyes.
'I expected him to be aloof. But he was just so nice. He had a strange kind of vulnerability about him. For the rest of the evening, although I was working on the other side of the cabin, we kept looking at each other. He was watching me serve drinks, staring intensely. He didn't have a meal and drank only a couple of glasses of Shiraz.
'But every time I looked up I saw that he was watching me. We were seriously flirting across the cabin, which is not like me. I've served a lot of famous people, including Shane Warne and Ian Thorpe, and I'm not usually like that at work.'
Lisa, who is divorced, continued with her duties, serving the evening meal before the cabin lights dimmed. There were only 12 passengers in business class that night.
Then, as she was preparing to go on her break, Fiennes made an unexpected suggestion. Lisa said: 'We had chatted a bit about India - where I've been five times - and his movies.
'When I told him I was going for a break, he said, "I might come and visit you for a chat, if that's OK." I was a bit surprised, but also thrilled. I said, "Sure."'
Lisa admits she was smitten by the star, but says she did not make the first move and had no thought of what might happen next.
It was 11pm and most of the other passengers were asleep. Lisa retired behind the curtained crew area, next to the cockpit, took off her shoes and put her feet up. But moments later she was interrupted by Fiennes.
'I'm sorry, were you sleeping?, he said. 'No,' she replied. 'Come in and take a seat.'
Lisa is not proud of what happened next, but she found Fiennes 'irresistible'. 'At first we just chatted,' she said. 'He sat really close to me. He told me he was learning lines for a new movie with Colin Farrell, playing the part of a gangster. He said he was practising his cockney accent.
'I asked him to give me an example. He did and it was really good. I told him again that The English Patient was just the best movie, but he said, 'That was over ten years ago. Why don't people value my later work?'
'I apologised and said I didn't mean to offend him. I guess we talked for about an hour about lots of different things. He thought it was funny that I lived alone with my dog, a Lhasa Apso-poodle cross called Finn.'
Fiennes told Lisa he was touring Indian villages for Unicef to talk about AIDS awareness. He asked what she would be doing in Bombay, where she was staying, and said, 'Do you want to meet up?'
Stunned and deeply flattered, Lisa said: 'Yeah. That would be cool.'
By this point they were sitting so close their faces were just inches apart. Lisa said: 'He held my hands. Then he started kissing me. The kissing was very passionate and his hands were all over me. I just melted.
'He was caressing my neck, holding my head and he started undoing the buttons on my dress. The way he was going, he would have made love to me right there.
'I was very turned on and so was he. I had butterflies in my stomach. I was touching his face and his hair. He had beautiful skin. I was undoing his shirt as well. It was a bit surreal, like a scene from one of his movies.
'But I was afraid my supervisor might pull back the curtain and catch us. Eventually, I couldn't bear it any longer. I just grabbed his hand and said, "Come in here a minute."
'By this time, we had half our clothes off and I didn't care about anything. I led him into the cabin lavatory next to where we had been sitting and locked the door.
'Ralph was a great lover. And I thought if I was going to get the sack, it would be worth it. I knew it was against the rules and wrong but I didn't care.
'I was a bit shocked that he didn't wear a condom. Looking back, I think of it as dangerous behaviour and
hypocritical given that he was going to India to talk about AIDS.
'He asked me, "Have you ever done this before?". I said, "No, never." I asked him the same question and he said, "No."
'The only strange thing was that he kept his eyes open the whole time, staring at me intensely, although we were kissing madly.
'I realised that people would miss me and wonder where I was as my break was almost over. I told him we had to get out of there quickly.
'I helped him get dressed and he told me that when he got out of the toilet he would press his call button to distract the other flight attendants so that I could leave.
'But a male member of staff saw Ralph come out of the toilet and he saw me lock the door after Ralph. When I came out, the member of staff was still there. I prepared to get back to work but the cabin manager wanted a word with me. She asked, "Did you go into the toilet with a male passenger?"
'I said, "No." But she said three people saw me do it. She told me I had crossed the line and that she was going to report me when we got back to Sydney.
'Ralph called me over and asked, "Is everything all right?" I told him, "No,"and sat down next to him. He was very concerned, but I downplayed it and said I would sort it out.
'I knew I was in big trouble. I was ordered to spend the rest of the flight working in economy and I was the talk of the other cabin crew. I was able to talk to Ralph again to reassure him that everything was fine. I wanted to see him again in Bombay. I didn't want him to freak out and not call me.'
Even now, almost a month after the incident on January 24, Lisa still seems to find the events surreal. She claims her behaviour was out of character but says: 'I just had no control over myself. I wanted him so much. I couldn't resist him.'
She has had only one other liaison with a man she met while working on a flight - an American with whom she had dinner and later spent a weekend in New York.
'But that was very much out of office hours,' she said. 'Men travelling business class are always coming on to me. They invite me to go for weekends away to lavish locations and nice hotels and give me their cards. But I usually just throw them away.'
Lisa had a sheltered upbringing with her two brothers in the town of Wagga Wagga near Sydney. Her father Graham, a butcher, and her mother Sandra were so protective that she did not have her first sexual relationship until the age of 20 when she went to the New South Wales police academy.
Lisa recalled: 'My mother had cancer when I was 11. She survived but it was traumatic. I never really had time for boys. I was the only girl in the middle of two brothers and I had a lot of responsibility.'
She also had low self-esteem. 'My brothers teased me about being flat-chested, so I've had breast implants. They said I was skinny and gawky. And I hated being 5ft 9in tall. I never felt attractive.'
She married a fellow police officer, John Duncan, and had a high-flying career in undercover drug work and hostage negotiation.
After 14 years her police service ended due to her suffering post-traumatic stress disorder and depression. And her marriage did not survive.
Indeed, she seems wary of men, saying she has been repeatedly exploited by them. 'So many treat you badly,' she said. 'They're just after sex. They're losers.' Ironically, she thought Fiennes was 'so sensitive, so different'.
Only now has Lisa begun to wonder. She has seen last week's reports claiming that he has been dumped by his girlfriend of five months, interior designer Sirin Lewenden, because of his wandering eye, mood swings and constant demands for sex. Their romance began after he split from his long-term partner, actress Francesca Annis.
On flight QF123, however, Fiennes seemed to Lisa an impossibly exotic lover, very different from the men she usually encounters. And while she says she never expected a romance, she didn't hesitate in saying yes when he asked her if he could meet her at his Bombay hotel.
Brimming with anticipation, Lisa stood next to Fiennes before he left the plane so they could talk. 'He was wearing a funny old white hat and a Kathmandu backpack, which made him look very eccentric,' she said.
'I gave him my mobile number and he repeatedly said he would call me. I was sad to see him go. I just wanted to go with him.'
Lisa had been at her hotel - the Grand Hyatt - for only about half an hour when Fiennes called her. He was on his way to his hotel, the Intercontinental, and wanted her to come over.
Lisa said: 'I had a shower, put on a little floral sun dress and my flip-flops. I put on minimum make-up and had a glass of Sauvignon blanc because I was a bit nervous.'
At the Intercontinental she found Fiennes was checked in, under his own name, to room 663, a lavish corner suite on the sixth floor. After calling the room, she was escorted up by security guards.
She said: 'Ralph opened the door with just a white towel around his waist. He said, 'Hi, how are you darling? Come in, I'm just having a bath. Make yourself a drink.'
'He dropped the towel and was wandering around naked. I was laughing, I thought it was hilarious. But I wander around naked a lot at home, so it didn't bother me. He had quite a nice body. It's obvious he's not a gym work-out kind of guy. For a man he's got quite a slender body, but I was attracted to him. It was a luxurious room - better than where I was staying. There was a bottle of red wine with a note on it saying, Welcome Mr Fiennes. I was like a kid in a sweet shop.
'He changed into a casual blue shirt and chinos and asked if I would like to have dinner with him. He'd heard there was a lovely restaurant on the roof. I said that would be great. I'd thought he would just keep me in the room, make love to me and throw me out.
'But it surprised me that he was a gentleman and he was treating this meeting like a real date.
'I wasn't particularly hungry and he doesn't eat much, so we just had snacks and ordered drinks. He had a Martini. There was a pool and the people around it recognised Ralph. He held my hand and had his arm around me, as if I was his girlfriend.
'He had been in Sydney performing a Beckett play and started to recite bits to me. He asked if I'd seen it. I told him it wasn't my kind of thing. I found that part of the date a bit boring.
'He didn't mention he had a girlfriend. I said I knew he went out with a famous actress, Francesca Annis, and that they'd broken up. He said, 'Yeah, it's been a bad year.'
'From his look of sadness and vulnerability, I guessed he was still in love with her. It was obvious that he was single and struggling with it.
'We had a couple more drinks. I spoke to him about The English Patient and asked him to say that line, 'It's a really plum plum' when the nurse is feeding his character the fruit. He did and I was thrilled. We went back to his room and I suggested we crack open the bottle of red. I poured us a glass each. He put on a DVD - Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels - which he said he was watching for research.
'I sat on the end of the bed. He came over, put his wine by the bed, threw off the top sheet and took off his clothes. I undressed at the same time. There was no conversation and in no time we were kissing and right into it.'
According to Lisa, they made love twice more through the evening - once in the middle of the night. But he told her, before they went back to sleep: 'I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to kick you out in the morning. I've got a lot of calls to make and things to do.'
Lisa said: -I felt fine about that. I understood but I was disappointed.
'I wasn't under any illusions that this would be the start of a romance. He is an upper-class Englishman and I knew it would be just about sex. But I thought we could keep a friendship and that we might make love when he visited Sydney.'
Lisa was woken at 7am by the sound of a mobile phone ringing, followed by Ralph talking. She said: 'He was sitting at the end of the bed. When the call ended he turned around and started kissing and cuddling me. We made love for about 20 minutes. It was excellent, really nice.
'But then he said, 'I'm going to have to kick you out now.' Just before I got out of bed, he said in a sincere, gentle voice, 'Lisa, I really like you.'
'I didn't even have a shower. I just went into the bathroom, tied my hair back and put on my flip-flops. He said, 'See you on the next Qantas flight,' to which I said, 'You will never fly Qantas again.' And he said, 'Oh yes I will.'
'He walked me to the door and kissed me and said, 'Goodbye, darling.' The casual way he said it was like he would see me next week.
'I had mixed feelings as the door closed behind me. I hoped he would call me again. I understood he had Unicef commitments but I was going to be in Bombay for two days, so I hoped he would find time to squeeze me in for another quick love-making session - or even a phone call. When he didn't call I realised I had to get over it. He was never going to.'
Lisa met her flight crew for drinks and confided in one friend, a pilot, what had happened. But she was horrified to learn that everyone seemed to have heard her making love with Fiennes in the lavatory. She says some of the girls were envious and giggled, saying: 'I wish it had been me.'
But Lisa knew her supervisor had reported her. 'I knew I was in big trouble,' she said. On January 26 she flew back to Sydney, where she was told by her management company, airline services contractor Morris Alexander Management, that she had been suspended without pay pending a disciplinary hearing.
On the advice of a lawyer she tried to make contact with Fiennes, leaving an urgent message at the Gate Theatre in Dublin, which had been behind his Beckett performances in Sydney. Within a few hours he called.
Lisa said: 'I told him I was in a lot of trouble and that I had been suspended from work. There was silence at the other end. I told him people had seen us leaving the toilet, but all he said was, 'Nothing happened.' He kept saying, 'We weren't in the toilet.' I told him I couldn't deny it. I said I had to answer the allegation.
Fiennes' reply, when it came, shocked Lisa to the core. She said: 'It was clear he was turning his back on me. He said, 'We don't know each other very well. I'm very sorry, I can't get involved. I can't help you.'
'I was desperate and suggested we said I was doing something like helping him with a contact lens. But he wouldn't agree.
'Then he told me, I've been scarred by an incident about a year ago when my life was dragged through the tabloids. My whole relationship was destroyed. It's ruined my life. You're just a hostess and you don't even like your job. You're not happy in your job. You can get another job.'
'I felt humiliated. It was like talking to a different person. He made me feel like a low-life, like I was asking him for money or something. Then he said, 'Let's have no further phone contact. I'll call you in a month's time, just to show you I'm a human being.' I was stunned.
'I told him, 'You're right. In the big scheme of things, it's not that important. It's just a job. If I do lose my job, it was worth it.'
'I ended the conversation on good terms, but I was angry and disappointed at his attitude and uncaring lack of support and sympathy.
I expected him to take some responsibility for our problem which suddenly became my problem.
'I thought about resigning to protect him. I felt sorry for him because of the speech he made about what he'd been through with the British papers. But I was frightened, I was depressed, I felt completely alone and I had no support.'
The betrayal evoked bitter memories of Lisa's troubled past. On leaving the police, she sued the force for lack of care over her mental health problems, but lost the case and was driven into bankruptcy.
She briefly studied law at James Cook University in Cairns, Australia. Then she met a stewardess and thought the job sounded fun. But the hard work and long hours did nothing to ease her depression, for which she still takes medication.
Now, after her fling with Fiennes, she is alone and faces losing her job. Her family have been critical of her and over the past week, since the story first emerged, their communication has been punctuated by fierce rows.
Now Lisa is even more wary of men. 'I've never been lucky in love,' she said. 'I just choose the wrong people. My last relationship, with an Italian flight steward, ended in June.'
Yet bizarrely she insists that, given the chance, she would make love to Fiennes in the lavatory again. 'It must sound crazy,' she said, 'but I wouldn't miss that experience for anything.'
She has convinced herself that Fiennes did care for her, however briefly, and that 'the experience was a lot more than just about sex'.
Does she feel used? 'No,' she insisted. 'We were both fantastically attracted to each other. I am sure he cared about me.
But she pauses, twisting a ring on her finger, as if for the first time considering the more brutal alternatives. 'Then again, she said, he is a very good actor.'
And she concedes that she was stung by his failure to support her story about the contact lens. It was a lie that might have helped her keep her job. 'I am upset by his betrayal,' she said. 'He is a millionaire movie star and I'm a struggling air hostess on £12,000 a year. I have financial problems and nothing to fall back on.
'He could have written a letter giving a version of events which the airline would have been forced to accept.
'What will I do now? Who knows? But I will bounce back. I always do. Maybe I'll finally take some time out to find out what I want and who I am. I should have done that years ago.'
