I worked at UA6 from 1981 to 1984. My brother worked there before I turned 16 so I’d spent a lot of time there getting to know the staff before I joined the crew. I saw Raiders of the Lost Ark there on opening night in theatre 1. I sat on the front row, even though I didn’t need to sit in front because the house was only half full. In case you don’t know, the ad campaign for Raiders of the Lost Ark wasn’t very good, so it took a little while for word-of-mouth to turn the movie into a hit.
I was there in 1982 when UA and the projectionist union failed to negotiate a new contract and, suddenly, our assistant managers were running the equipment. Most of them didn’t like doing it. One Monday night, when it was the manager’s night off, the assistant manager, Connie, pulled me upstairs and showed me how to run the projectors. She was tired of having to do everything by herself that night. I was 17 years old and I was fascinated by the projectors. Pretty soon, without actually being an assistant manager, I was given the green light by Josephine to run the projectors. A few months later we had the 70mm projector installed in time for Return of the Jedi and I got to run that system too.
Eventually, Josephine became a district manager and Connie became the manager in 1984. I left at the end of the summer of 1984. Then, in December of that year, Connie died in a car accident. Rumor has it that Josephine was so distraught about Connie’s death that Josephine left the movie theatre business. Nobody I know seems to know anything about what happened to Josephine after about 1985.
One of the guys who started working there is 1982 was Delfin Fernandez. He stayed in the movie theatre business and worked his way up. By the 1990s he was running a major chain’s operations in South America. In 2014 he retired from Hoyts, a theatre company based in Australia, after being their CEO for 9 years. Imagine it! And he started out with us right there at UA6.
One of our dear employees was Ward Wallach, who was enthralled with all things Japanese. His dream was to go to Japan and study there. And he did! But then in 1985 we were shocked to learn that Ward died in the crash of JAL Flight 123. According to his wishes, his ashes were left at a Buddhist temple in Japan.
I still keep in touch with friends from that theatre.
I worked at UA6 from 1981 to 1984. My brother worked there before I turned 16 so I’d spent a lot of time there getting to know the staff before I joined the crew. I saw Raiders of the Lost Ark there on opening night in theatre 1. I sat on the front row, even though I didn’t need to sit in front because the house was only half full. In case you don’t know, the ad campaign for Raiders of the Lost Ark wasn’t very good, so it took a little while for word-of-mouth to turn the movie into a hit.
I was there in 1982 when UA and the projectionist union failed to negotiate a new contract and, suddenly, our assistant managers were running the equipment. Most of them didn’t like doing it. One Monday night, when it was the manager’s night off, the assistant manager, Connie, pulled me upstairs and showed me how to run the projectors. She was tired of having to do everything by herself that night. I was 17 years old and I was fascinated by the projectors. Pretty soon, without actually being an assistant manager, I was given the green light by Josephine to run the projectors. A few months later we had the 70mm projector installed in time for Return of the Jedi and I got to run that system too.
Eventually, Josephine became a district manager and Connie became the manager in 1984. I left at the end of the summer of 1984. Then, in December of that year, Connie died in a car accident. Rumor has it that Josephine was so distraught about Connie’s death that Josephine left the movie theatre business. Nobody I know seems to know anything about what happened to Josephine after about 1985.
One of the guys who started working there is 1982 was Delfin Fernandez. He stayed in the movie theatre business and worked his way up. By the 1990s he was running a major chain’s operations in South America. In 2014 he retired from Hoyts, a theatre company based in Australia, after being their CEO for 9 years. Imagine it! And he started out with us right there at UA6.
One of our dear employees was Ward Wallach, who was enthralled with all things Japanese. His dream was to go to Japan and study there. And he did! But then in 1985 we were shocked to learn that Ward died in the crash of JAL Flight 123. According to his wishes, his ashes were left at a Buddhist temple in Japan.
I still keep in touch with friends from that theatre.
I have a million other stories.