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\n Photo: MTV Documentary Films\/YouTube\/A24\n <\/p>\n
Being a figure who gets the fictional Hollywood treatment is always an unnerving prospect, especially in an era when it\u2019s increasingly uncommon for a subject to have no say in shaping their own portrayal. Especially when Robert Pattinson, who\u2019s in the running to be the freakiest male actor of our generation, has been cast to portray you \u2014 or at least a character \u201cinspired by\u201d you who also happens to share your name (and most of your biography). And especially when it sure looks like he\u2019s portraying you as a megalomaniacal television man increasingly drunk on his own growing fame and power in a movie that looks like a wackadoodle neon-fever dream.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the predicament Chris Hansen finds himself in. Hansen was the host of To Catch a Predator, the mid-aughts Dateline segment in which he led a team that used law enforcement to lure and film online child predators in sting operations. He is the subject of A24\u2019s Primetime<\/a>, first announced in 2024<\/a> with Pattinson attached to star and documentarian Lance Oppenheim (Spermworld, Ren Faire<\/a>) set to make his narrative-feature debut as director. Tagged \u201cinspired by true events\u201d and slated for release on September 26, following its Venice Film Festival premiere on September 5, the film is based on Luke Dittrich\u2019s 2007 Esquire article \u201cTonight on Dateline This Man Will Die,\u201d<\/a> which chronicles the 2006 Predator sting in Texas that ended in tragedy. A24 dropped the first trailer<\/a> on August 6, offering a glimpse of Pattinson\u2019s thoroughly unhinged, high-voltage take on Hansen. \u201cWhat you\u2019re doing is more than acting,\u201d he tells one of his decoys. \u201cYou\u2019re cleansing the world of an ancient evil.\u201d Faced with the impending prospect of such a portrayal \u2014 one that could lead to awards-season visibility for Pattinson \u2014 Hansen has unsurprisingly begun to assert some control over his narrative, or at least as much as he can.<\/p>\n After To Catch a Predator\u2019s run originally ended in late 2007, Hansen stuck around NBC for a few more years until the network opted not to renew his contract in 2013. It didn\u2019t take him long to return to his Predator concept, which has since grown into a sprawling digital-media operation including a podcast, a series, and a direct-to-consumer streaming service called TruBlu, which packages his particular brand of predator-hunting entertainment. He pops up at events like CrimeCon to hold court as an elder statesman of the modern true-crime economy, with all the moral, ethical, and capitalistic dicey-ness it represents. Primetime gives him something he hasn\u2019t had in a while: a Hollywood-size spotlight on the Chris Hansen brand. And he seems game to squeeze every drop of juice out of it.<\/p>\n Below, a timeline of Hansen\u2019s responses to the movie he, as of this writing, still hasn\u2019t seen.<\/p>\n Hansen\u2019s first known response to Primetime arrived during a May 29 sit-down with NewsNation\u2019s Jesse Weber<\/a>, recorded in Las Vegas at this year\u2019s CrimeCon convention, where Weber dubbed Hansen its \u201cde facto mayor.\u201d The conversation covered several topics, but Weber briefly sidestepped to ask Hansen about the teaser A24 had released a few days earlier. \u201cWhat? There\u2019s a movie trailer? What will they think of next?\u201d Hansen responded, sounding less than enthused. The teaser offered only fleeting glimpses of the film, with Pattinson \u2014 \u201cHe\u2019s an actor, right? Young, talented guy?\u201d Hansen asked \u2014 narrating as a fictionalized version of the Predator host.<\/p>\n Hansen was noticeably circumspect here. When Weber asked whether he knew a film about him was in the works, he replied, \u201cWe had heard that there was something like this in the works. They reached out to me this week, and I\u2019ve been asked not to talk about it a great deal at this point. But I\u2019ll come back on, and we\u2019ll talk about it.\u201d The conversation then abruptly pivoted to Jeffrey Epstein.<\/p>\n Hansen started talking a great deal about Primetime a few months later during an appearance on Serialously<\/a>, the true-crime podcast and YouTube show hosted by Annie Elise, better known as the host of 10 to Life. By this point, Primetime had received a sustained jolt of attention from its first full trailer, and Elise asked Hansen how he felt about the project:<\/p>\n Elise: Obviously Primetime is coming out with Robert Pattinson starring as you, which is crazy to think, I imagine? What was it like getting that call? Not only that they were going to be doing a movie, but also that he was going to be playing you.\u00a0<\/p>\n Hansen: Well we had heard, you know \u2026 Obviously with all the different properties I have and all the platforms, some of the people who are involved in the management also tangentially have relationships in the Hollywood world. So we had heard that this was in the works. A couple months ago, they came out and said, \u201cHey look, we\u2019re doing this. We\u2019d like you to, you know, have some sort of consideration in terms of helping us with this.\u201d I haven\u2019t seen it.<\/p>\n Elise: Did you sit in on any of the filming or work as a consultant or anything?\u00a0<\/p>\n Hansen: No.<\/p>\n Elise: So they put together their whole story line just independently.\u00a0<\/p>\n Hansen: They did. And then came to me. Correct.\u00a0<\/p>\n Hansen noted that the studio was planning a \u201cprivate screening\u201d for him, so until he got a chance to watch it, he was mostly withholding judgment. \u201cMy suspicion is that they used my name because it helps in a commercial enterprise,\u201d he said. \u201cAs a reporter, it\u2019s sort of silly for me to talk about something that I haven\u2019t seen yet. So I\u2019m gonna see it.\u201d His thoughts on the trailer? \u201cIt looks very dramatic.\u201d But beyond that, he professed skepticism about the whole enterprise: \u201cI also have some questions here. What\u2019s Hollywood\u2019s motive here? We don\u2019t know, but I\u2019ll find out.\u201d<\/p>\n There was one thing about Primetime that Hansen seemed genuinely disappointed by: He hadn\u2019t gotten to make his own version of his life story. He claimed that years earlier, he had written a script and envisioned a very different leading man<\/a>. \u201cI didn\u2019t get to choose my own guy,\u201d he told Elise. \u201cYears ago, I had crafted a script and thought Denis Leary would be a good guy to play me, depending on the age of it all.\u201d<\/p>\n Three days later, Hansen had still not seen Primetime. He appeared on Jesse Watters\u2019s Fox News show on August 20<\/a> sometime after his scheduled morning private screening at A24\u2019s offices, which, according to him, never happened.<\/p>\n Hansen said that upon his arrival, the studio presented him with a much more expansive NDA than he was willing to sign. According to his account, he would have had to sign away the rights to his name, image, and \u201cbrand, essentially,\u201d along with \u201cany potential legal rights\u201d that might arise from the film. \u201cWho would sign something like that?\u201d he asked. \u201cIt was a very restrictive agreement. I\u2019ve never seen anything quite like it.\u201d Hansen found it particularly strange given that, as he understood it, other people had already seen the movie without signing one. Hansen refused to sign it, so he was not admitted to the screening. \u201cYou and I are gonna have to go to the theater and see it when it comes out, I guess!\u201d he told Watters.<\/p>\n Later that day, The Hollywood Reporter published reporting<\/a> that conflicted Hansen\u2019s account. The outlet learned that Hansen had been asked to sign a standard NDA about a week before the screening, one that \u201call preview audiences must sign in order to watch an unreleased A24 film\u201d to \u201cprevent spoilers and protect the studio\u2019s IP.\u201d \u201cPage Six\u201d later confirmed THR\u2019s reporting<\/a> via a \u201cstudio source,\u201d with the added detail that A24 \u201cinvited him to suggest edits to the contract.\u201d<\/p>\n Competing narratives aside, what\u2019s striking about Hansen\u2019s appearances on both Serialously and Watters\u2019s show is the extent to which he projects a genial disposition about all this \u2014\u00a0as if it was all a funny, weird thing happening that\u2019s an amusing distraction from his doing his real work: \u201cI\u2019ve been busy being the real Chris Hansen,\u201d he told Elise, \u201cso I don\u2019t have a lot of time to focus on the fake Chris Hansen in the movies.\u201d Which plugs directly into \u2026<\/p>\n Say one thing about the guy: He knows an opportunity when he sees one.<\/p>\n On August 26, THR reported that Hansen had purchased preshow advertising on every theater screen showing Primetime, with the ads promoting TruBlu. The spot, which is viewable in the THR write-up<\/a>, places Hansen in his natural habitat: a nondescript suburban kitchen where he pops out of a corner, addresses the audience directly, and makes the case for the continued relevance of his work. \u201cI\u2019ve spent decades working with law enforcement to catch predators before they exploit our children,\u201d he says in the ad. \u201cNow there are more platforms than ever before where this disturbing crime is being committed. And we are there to take down the predators.\u201d A QR code directs viewers to TruBlu. THR also reported that Hansen wanted to include a kicker to the spot noting that Primetime is \u201ca Hollywood fantasy version\u201d of events, but the line was ultimately struck over concerns of \u201cblowback\u201d from A24.<\/p>\n An escalation. The same THR story that broke the news of the ad buy noted that Hansen is \u201cnow consulting attorneys about his options,\u201d and then the following day, \u201cPage Six\u201d put a finer point on it<\/a>: Hansen is \u201copen to the possibility of suing\u201d over the film, depending on how he is portrayed. Here, Hansen\u2019s complaint seems less an outright declaration of war than a demand for recognition. \u201cAt this point it\u2019s about courtesy,\u201d he told \u201cPage Six.\u201d \u201cIf you make a movie using someone\u2019s name and likeness, you\u2019d think you\u2019d reach out to them about it.\u201d<\/p>\n But during an appearance on SiriusXM\u2019s The Dan Abrams Show<\/a> released the same day, Hansen went further. \u201cI got a call from one of my producers, or the main producer on that series\u201d \u2014 portrayed by Merritt Wever in the movie \u2014 \u201cwho was upset the other day because it cast her in a negative light,\u201d he told Abrams, a former NBC colleague. \u201cShe was seen doing things in the trailer that she had never done. And what upset her most was, they had me yelling at my team, which I had never done in 45 years of being a television reporter. So there are a lot of negative things in there that aren\u2019t true.\u201d<\/p>\n Hansen also offered more details about his interactions with A24 and the NDA he refused to sign. He said the studio first contacted him on May 27, the day before the teaser was released, to express interest in his involvement in promoting the film, including through advertising on TruBlu. He told Abrams he later learned through a \u201cthird party\u201d who had a relationship to Oppenheim that the director had not contacted Hansen because it was the studio\u2019s responsibility and he didn\u2019t think Hansen needed to be involved.<\/p>\n As for the NDA, Hansen said the studio emailed the agreement to him about a week before his scheduled private screening, and \u201cmultiple attorneys with great and vast experience in the Hollywood arena\u201d advised him not to sign it or comment immediately. He later learned that David Osit, the filmmaker behind the documentary Predators<\/a>, had seen the film without signing an NDA, further fueling his unwillingness to sign. He claimed that an A24 publicist told him that Pattinson and Oppenheim wanted him to be happy with the movie; in that case, he told Abrams, they should\u2019ve reached out much earlier. \u201cThey were sneaky and disingenuous about it,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is not art imitating reality. This is art exploiting the good work of somebody.\u201d<\/p>\n As of August 28, Hansen is still on the fence about legal action. \u201cOne guy \u2014 somebody who\u2019s very, very good at all this and very entrenched in entertainment law \u2014 he said, \u2018You know, you can do that, and you probably have a decent case. How much time do you want to spend doing it?\u201d he told Abrams. But given the fast and furious way he\u2019s been litigating this in the court of public opinion, this could change quickly. Then again, Hansen is in a tricky situation. After all, there\u2019s a thin line between reclaiming the narrative and triggering the Streisand effect.<\/p>\n Sign up for the Vulture Daily<\/p>\n An entertainment newsletter for the pop-culture obsessed.<\/p>\n Vox Media, LLC Terms and Privacy Notice<\/p>\n