WARNING: Before scrolling, please be aware that this story includes a photo of one of the crew’s injury

A PRODUCTION crew has told how they were attacked by a machete-wielding gang while filming outside Amy Winehouse’s former home.

While film crews have set up camp around Camden Town to capture the new Amy Winehouse biopic, actor and producer Hector Ioannides told the New Journal about a violent robbery that happened while they were shooting outside the singer’s old house in Camden Square last summer.

Mr Ioannides, 33, said: “We’d just finished shooting London’s Forgotten, which ironically was about knife crime. That was filmed at nighttime and it felt quite dodgy so we had security.

“But this scene [was shot] in Camden at 4pm. We thought, ‘What’s the worst that can happen?’ And then after we were like, ‘Ok, we’ve learned our lesson. So we’re never doing that again.’”

They were in the leafy streets of Camden Square working on Bilby, a feature film about an old man who drives an ice cream van to the coast to reconnect with an ex-lover.

As they were shooting the last scene three men wearing balaclavas approached them on electric bikes. They started swinging a machete and threatened to harm the group if they did not hand over their filming equipment and car keys.

Mr Ioannides, who goes by his stage name Hector Helsing, said: “I had just got back from base when I saw my friends squaring up with people. “I saw everyone walking backwards apart from my friend Anthreas Eleutheriou who walked into it. He’s got experience in martial arts and wrestling. So he was like, ‘I need to protect everyone else’.

“I saw the beginning of the scuffle happen, and my immediate reaction was, ‘Oh, no, there’s three guys. What if another 10 show up?’ So I went to one of my producers and I asked him to call the police and he was in shock.”

Mr Eleutheriou deflected the first attempted machete blow and then got his attacker in a chokehold before throwing him onto the ground.

“He was trying to cut my friend’s throat,” Mr Ioannides said. After a bit of a scuffle the attacker got up and said: “I’ll kill you.” Mr Ioannides came over and the three assailants cycled off.

Mr Eleutheriou’s slashed leg

His colleague sustained cuts that required stitches.

“I think everyone has a bit of PTSD,” he said. “Since then because whenever I hear one of the bikes that are electric but you can pedal as well, I can feel my fight or flight instinct kick off. “I get ready for something to go down.”

Police confirmed that in November a 17-year-old boy was arrested in connection with the incident. He has been released on bail until May.

Nobody has been charged with any offence. Any witnesses or anyone with any information is asked to the call police on 101 quoting CAD 5549/09JUL22.

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