Robert Pattinson Reacts to Chris Hansen’s Remarks About ‘Primetime’

The exchange caps weeks of public tension between the actor and the veteran newsman over the upcoming thriller. While Hansen has openly weighed his legal options, Pattinson maintains the film was never meant to be about him personally.

Robert Pattinson is responding to Chris Hansen's remarks about the new A24 film, "Primetime."

The movie follows the Dateline journalist and the fraught production, ethical gray areas and media sensationalism surrounding his show, "To Catch a Predator," which aired from 2004 to 2007.

At a press conference ahead of the film's premiere at the Venice Film Festival in Italy on Saturday, September 5, Pattinson, 40, fielded questions about Hansen's comments on the thriller, including the former TV host's skepticism about the "Hollywood motive" behind the project.

"I mean, obviously I hope he likes the movie," Pattinson said.

"I never really set out to make a movie about Chris Hansen. I would hope in some ways, like, the amount of inspiration that his character has kind of given certain people who are involved in this [film] for like years now, I hope is some kind of compliment."

In the psychological thriller, Pattinson's character sets out to make history with his 2000s hidden-camera series, which featured Hansen confronting adult men who believed they were meeting up with a minor for sex.

"I think the more you watch a show, there's something like magnetic about his presence," Pattinson added of Hansen. "I watched a show when I was younger and I didn't even think about it.

"I mean, when you kind of obsessively watch it, you realize there's a strange alchemy with what's going on with the status of the show and how it was directed and how things got together and the time period," he continued.

"But something he's doing is the reason why people are still talking about that show 20 years later," he went on. "And it's not to do necessarily solely with subject matter. I just think there was something about the show that was very groundbreaking, kind of breaking the rules of television."

The remarks arrive after Hansen suggested he was weighing his options regarding "Primetime" during an appearance on Dan Abrams' SiriusXM podcast on Wednesday, August 26. The 66-year-old said the film was produced without his input.

"People are looking at it, Dan," the former NBC correspondent told Abrams, ABC News' chief legal analyst.

He continued, "I don't know. One guy told me, somebody who's very, very good at all this and very entrenched in entertainment law, he said, 'You know, you can do that, and you probably have a decent case. How much time do you want to spend doing it?'"

Hansen had offered earlier thoughts on the project during an interview with podcaster Annie Elise last month, revealing that filmmakers had approached him only after the movie was already in motion.

He continued, "As a reporter, it's sort of silly for me to talk about something that I haven't seen yet. My suspicion is that they used my name because it helps in a commercial enterprise."

Hansen also appeared on Fox News' "Jesse Watters Primetime," where he revealed he'd turned down a chance to screen the film ahead of its release.

He claimed the studio had asked him "to sign away [his] rights to [his] name, image and brand, essentially, as well as any potential legal rights that would come out of the movie."