Aoife Hinds has recalled the shocking moment a group of pre-teens shouted racial slurs at her while filming Normal People.
The actress, who played Helen in the hit series, was racially abused while they tried to film a scene on the streets of Dublin.
Speaking on The Six O’Clock Show, Aoife said: “It was quite shocking because we were in the middle of a scene and these pre-teens kind of ran into me with their bike and started shouting racial slurs at me.”
“I mean it’s something I’ve had to deal with my whole life.”
“Whether it be in Ireland, France, Spain or England and I mean over this past year the media has said there’s been a rise in it because of the pandemic.
“I count myself lucky that I have never been physically attacked. I have a friend who was physically attacked in Central London at the beginning of the pandemic.”
Aoife is the daughter of Irish actor Ciarán Hinds and French actress Hélène Patarot, who is originally from Vietnam.
During a previous interview with the Sunday World, the actress revealed her co-star Paul Mescal went to confront the group of pre-teens, but she told him not to bother.
Aoife said: “We were all just baffled. Paul started to walk towards them as they were running off. I told him not to bother as I wanted to brush if off and get back to the scene, but that was obviously a defence mechanism.”
“I later regretted that and wished Paul had have gone over to them, to tell them it wasn’t OK to say those kind of things. Or better, to calmly go over to them myself.”
“All the crew were extremely supportive, needless to say shocked, but it just goes to show how racism is ingrained in our society when kids are being brought up hearing all these kind of things.”
