Chris Hansen is not at the Venice Film Festival for this weekend’s world premiere of a film inspired by his work on To Catch a Predator, but the man still proved to be the center of attention during Primetime‘s press conference.
“Obviously, I hope he likes the movie,” said Robert Pattinson when asked about Hansen’s early objections to Lance Oppenheim‘s A24 film and the fact that he purchased pre-show advertising for his streaming platform. Pattinson stars as Hansen and boarded the film early as a producer but said, “I never really set out to make a movie about Chris Hansen. I never really thought about it, and then I saw [Ajon Singh’s] script, and there’s something electrifying about it. I would hope, in some ways, the amount of inspiration that his character has given so many people who are involved in this for years now is some kind of compliment.”
Oppenheim said he first discovered To Catch a Predator through parodies of it on shows like South Park. “And when I finally saw To Catch a Predator, I was amazed. Chris Hansen was this like mythological being who had these one-liners that reminded me of Tony Montana [in Scarface]. His version of ‘say hello to my little friend’ was ‘have a seat right there.’ I was always fascinated as a young child with the theatricality of the show. I was so confused by it. Was it a prank show? Was it a news show? Was it a circus with Chris Hansen as a ringleader?”
