Studio Projectionist’s Long and Colorful Career Fades to Black : Movies: Warner Bros. toasts the retiring 57-year employee who unspooled films for show-biz people ranging from the Beatles to Burt Lancaster.

Julian Ullman has sat through thousands of movies. But starting today, he won’t have to work so hard at it.

Ullman, 75, the chief projectionist at Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank and its longest-standing employee, retired Monday. During his 57-year tenure, he unspooled films for show business figures from the Beatles to former studio head Jack Warner.

Ullman has been feted by the studio for the past month. Parties and a dinner have been held in his honor. Studio executives presented him with a video camera at a retirement party.

“Nobody has ever fussed about me before,” said Ullman, a soft-spoken, quick-smiling man. “I guess they suddenly realized they had a person who had actually been here all these years.”

Ullman, who lives in West Los Angeles with his wife, was hired in 1933 as a messenger and worked for a short time in the mimeograph department before becoming a projectionist.

Ullman worked with composers Max Steiner, Franz Waxman and Dimitri Tiomkin, rerunning reels of films repeatedly to help them time musical scores. He remembers seeing parts of “My Fair Lady” over and over as music editors worked on it. He served as a stage projectionist on the sets of such films as “Mildred Pierce,” “Bright Leaf” and “Finian’s Rainbow.”

But some of his most vivid memories dealt with carting heavy cartridges of film to the houses of producers or stars who wanted to take a closer look at a film in progress or see the finished product. He would regularly go to the houses of Warner or producers Hal Wallis or Milton Sperling to screen films in their private theaters. The sessions sometimes lasted into the early morning.

“Jack Warner was a pretty nice guy when I had to screen for him,” Ullman recalled. “He would offer me a Coke. But he always made sure I knew my place.”

From 1953 to the late 1960s, Ullman went to actor Burt Lancaster’s house weekly to screen films for him and his family. “I watched his five children grow up,” he said. “Burt was a gentleman. He always made me feel like I was part of the family.”

At one time, Lancaster had to assure Richard Brooks, who directed the actor’s 1960 classic “Elmer Gantry,” that Ullman could be trusted to run “Elmer Gantry” at Lancaster’s house before its release. “He didn’t want anyone to see the film before it was finished, and he called and interviewed me to see if I was OK and to make sure I didn’t divulge the ending,” he said.

But one of his fondest recollections involved the Beatles on their first visit to Los Angeles during the early 1960s. The group was eager to see a movie, but frantic fans were mobbing them everywhere they went. Lancaster’s children worked out a deal: The Beatles could come to the house and watch the film peacefully, as long as the children could watch with them.

“So I screened this movie for the Beatles,” Ullman said, chuckling. “They were all quite nice. I even got an autographed picture of them.”

Ullman still is a big fan of films, even if he isn’t showing them. He has a special affection for films of the 1940s, ‘50s and ‘60s, but dislikes the violence and sex in some current films. “I couldn’t handle ‘Texas Chainsaw Massacre’ at all.”

He said he plans to spend his retirement taking college history classes and traveling with his wife of 15 years, Lillian.

Of course, he plans to take in a few movies, too.

“That won’t stop. It’s one of my favorite things to do.”