Afaik, atomizers with breath spray used to be pretty common. I used to take care of old folks, some of whom went through the great depression as adults. A lot of them had those.

Disposable ones have been a thing since at least the 50s, if my memory isn’t failing. Binaca used to have commercials back before cable was ubiquitous, and a lot of people carried some to freshen up breath.

So, somewhere along the way, the specific trope of a guy spraying once or twice before hitting on a woman crept into social awareness. I never dug too deep looking into it, but it allegedly apparently was a thing.

The culture of lots of coffee at work followed by a drink or three after at a bar wasn’t exactly great for oral hygiene overall, and definitely makes breath funky.

The singer part of the trope, where you see them spritz before hitting the stage is supposedly a different thing. That was from stage actors, but that’s as far as I’ve ever looked, that it was a thing. No idea what they used, what the reasoning was. Never piqued my curiosity enough to look deeper.