This article from NYTimes.com has been sent to you by psa188@xxxxxxxxx /-------------------- advertisement -----------------------\ THE DREAMERS - IN SELECT CITIES FEBRUARY 6 Set against the turbulent political backdrop of 1968 France when the voice of youth was reverberating around Europe, THE DREAMERS is a story of self-discovery as three students test each other to see just how far they will go. "Pure Bertolucci," proclaims The New Yorker. THE DREAMERS makes its North American premiere at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival. http://www.foxsearchlight.com/thedreamers/index_nyt.html \----------------------------------------------------------/ Business Travel: A Better Night’s Sleep, Flat Out at 35,000 Feet January 27, 2004 By SUSAN STELLIN A good night's sleep at home can mean sinking into a foot-thick mattress with six pillows and linens with a thread count approaching four digits. Approximating that level of luxury on a long-haul flight is all but impossible, but a number of airlines have recently taken on the challenge, overhauling their business-class cabins with an eye toward making bedtime at 35,000 feet a lot more comfortable. In the last year, Virgin Atlantic Airways, Qantas, Northwest Airlines, All Nippon Airways and Lufthansa have begun rolling out new seats and amenities in business class, offering everything shy of a bedtime story to help weary executives get some rest. Although the upgrades vary in style and design, the changes have spawned something of a common nomenclature for comfort: mood lighting, lumbar support and privacy screens are de rigueur, as are seats that recline to a flat bed within some type of cocoon. Seats with catchy names are catching on, too. Qantas, the first carrier to offer business class in 1979, introduced a new sleeper seat in September - the Skybed - which reclines to a flat bed within a "cocoon style" shell. (The seats, which have back massagers, holders for water bottles and cupboards for shoes, are available on routes between Australia and Europe, with plans to use them on United States routes by April.) Indeed, the competition to create the longest, flattest or widest business-class seat is a matter of serious bragging rights these days: the Skybed is 78.5 inches long and 23.5 inches wide when fully reclined, though Virgin Atlantic's new bed is an inch longer, and what Singapore Airlines calls its Spacebed is 27 inches wide when reclined. When it was introduced late in 2002, the Spacebed was considered the seat to beat, and Singapore Airlines' business class has been rated the best in the sky, most recently winning accolades from Business Traveler magazine. Although most of the new beds extend to a flat surface, the Spacebed and several others deemed "flat" are not quite parallel to the floor of the aircraft. That incline from horizontal is usually expressed in degrees - as in, "reclines to 172 degrees" - a feature several airline representatives said took into account the fact that planes typically fly at an angle. Not all business travelers agree with that idea. A truly flat bed "does make a difference," said Kieran Donovan, who works for a retailer in Britain and takes about 100 flights a year. "Your bed at home is flat, so you're used to sleeping horizontally, not at a 5-degree angle," he said. "On an incline, you get this strange feeling of the blood rushing down to your feet." Mr. Donovan - who has flown in business class on British Airways, Cathay Pacific Airways and Singapore Airlines - said he preferred the British Airways bed because it is truly flat, though he likes the width of the Singapore Airlines Spacebed and the bedding on Cathay Pacific. "You get a pillow that is silk-faced on one side and cotton-faced on the other," he said, "whereas British Airways loses out for their rather nasty blankets and pillows." Although British Airways introduced the first business-class seat that converts to a truly flat bed, in 2000, its competitor for trans-Atlantic passengers, Virgin Atlantic, set the bar a bit higher last fall with the rollout of its new Upper Class Suite. Virgin pioneered the concept of having a seat and a bed made of different materials, with a seat that flips over to a completely flat bed with the push of a button. "We realized that if we could get the passenger to stand up and get the seat to convert into a bed, we could have new foams and fabrics for sleeping on," said Joe Ferry, Virgin Atlantic's head of design. "The crew can make up the bed for passengers while they go and have a drink at the bar. All of this ritual and theater adds to the experience of going to bed." Besides the new bed, Virgin's Upper Class is configured to give all passengers access to the aisle, ottomans that double as seats for companions, an onboard bar and inflight beauty treatments. Virgin also offers its Upper Class passengers free limousine service to and from the airport on each end of the flight, and its Revivals lounge at Heathrow Airport provides a place for breakfast and a shower. Those arrival features particularly appeal to John Lahr, senior drama critic for The New Yorker magazine, who has flown across the Atlantic every two weeks for the last decade. "The Virgin lounge is state of the art, as far as I'm concerned," he said. "You go into a cubicle, take off all your clothes and put them in a two-sided closet. Then they press your clothes while you're taking a shower. That's just wonderful. There's nothing worse than arriving rumpled at 7 in the morning when your tongue is sour and your head feels like a hundred pounds." His company's travel policy requires him to fly British Airways, so he has not tried Virgin's new seats, and his main complaint about British Airways has nothing to do with sleeping. "When I'm flying from London to New York,'' he said, "I tend not to sleep because I'm flying into the sun - I tend to work on the plane. So what I hate is the regimen of closing windows; because people want to watch a B movie, everybody else has to shut their shades." Mr. Lahr added that the privacy screens between seats block much of the overhead light. Beth Shultis, vice president for marketing and loyalty programs at Northwest Airlines, said privacy screens were the subject of much research when the airline was designing its new World Business Class seats. "There's a very delicate line on how to give enough privacy when passengers are sleeping, but still have an open enough environment that they can socialize and converse over dinner," she said. Even with all the new amenities, and the more comfortable (if significantly more expensive) experience flying business class rather than coach, a long-haul flight for a half-day meeting is not always preferable to a typical day at the office - and sleeping in one's own bed. "The first time it's novel," said an executive who flies business or first class on occasion, but did not want his name used lest he appear ungrateful for his company's largess. But after a while, he said, the flat beds and DVD players lose their appeal. "You're still on a plane,'' he said, "and it's still not great." Readers are invited to send stories about business travel experiences to businesstravel@xxxxxxxxxxxx http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/27/business/27sleep.html?ex=1076385040&ei=1&en=010f8fce775a36ac --------------------------------- Get Home Delivery of The New York Times Newspaper. Imagine reading The New York Times any time & anywhere you like! Leisurely catch up on events & expand your horizons. 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