THEY were watching The Great Dictator, Charlie Chaplin’s satire of the Nazi Germany regime, when a Luftwaffe bomb crashed down through the roof of the National Picture Theatre in Hull.

Only two large concrete beams saved the lives of the 150 filmgoers inside the cinema on the March 1941 night of the bombing raid. It was, many agreed, a miracle that no-one was killed.

Now, the cinema – one of the UK’s last remaining relics of bomb damage from the Second World War – is to be given a new lease of life as an education centre and memorial.

Listed as a Grade II historic building because of its significance as a rare surviving blitzed building, the remains of the National Picture Theatre have stood on Beverley Road since the raid.

Last May, the National Heritage Lottery Fund awarded the restoration project a £227,600 grant to cover repair and conservation work, including a full restoration of the façade.

Another £178,300 is coming from Hull City Council, with a further contribution from the volunteer-run National Civilian World War II Memorial Trust, which has campaigned for 20 years for the site to be saved and re-used.

The cinema’s auditorium will be transformed into an events area, education centre, and a garden memorial to people living and working in Hull during the Second World War.

As well as restoring the façade to period style, including iconic windows and signage, the renovation aims to preserve structural elements such as those concrete beams that saved so many lives.

Designed by architects Runton and Barry for the De-Luxe Theatre Company and constructed in 1914, the former National Picture Theatre had a façade in redbrick, dressed in Portland stone, and could accommodate 1,050 people in stalls and balcony seats.

When refurbishment is complete, the building will remember those who served on the Home Front, and those who died in the war. Hull was the second most bombed city in the UK during the Blitz of 1940 and 1941, leaving only 5,945 out of 91,660 houses undamaged.

The Great Dictator, released in 1940 was Chaplin’s first true talkie after previous silent movie releases, and was a black comedy with an anti-war message satirising Hitler’s regime. Chaplin wrote, directed, produced and scored the film.

For tourist information about Hull and its attractions, see www.visithull.org