Robert Pattinson Is a Pretty Perfect Chris Hansen in ‘Primetime’ Trailer

Another day, another glorious new accent from Robert Pattinson. On Wednesday, A24 unveiled the first teaser trailer for Primetime, ahead of its debut in theaters later this year (and, presumably, ahead of the footage being shown during screenings of Backrooms this weekend). The film, which was first announced to be in the works in 2024, follows “a journalist who takes on an underworld of crime and changes television forever,” in a story that a lot of people assumed would be loosely inspired by To Catch a Predator host Chris Hansen.

Now, the trailer flat-out confirms that Pattinson is playing Hansen himself… and his impression is honestly terrific. To an extent, this shouldn’t be surprising, given Pattinson’s ability to shift his accents and voice to play everything from Batman to a Studio Ghibli bird to whatever voice he’s doing in Dune: Part Three later this year. Still, it is delightful to hear Pattinson in the role, delivering a string of lines that sound exactly like how Hansen would conduct segments of the show.

“What would have happened if I wasn’t here?” Hansen asks. “You see how this looks, right? At the end of the day, a man must be held accountable for the decisions that he makes. Would you agree? Do you watch television? Well, there’s something you should know. I’m Chris Hansen with Dateline NBC — and you’re able to be a part of television history.”

What Is Primetime About?

According to A24’s official description of the film, Primetime is set in 2006, as “To Catch a Predator host Chris Hansen sets out to make television history.” Given the fact that To Catch a Predator began in 2004, this setting seems to indicate that Primetime‘s dramatization of events won’t be a complete sort of “origin story” for the series itself.

There have been theories that Primetime centers around the show’s handling of Bill Conradt, an assistant district attorney in Rockwall County, Texas who was confronted by the show as part of a sting operation in Murphy, Texas. As the authorities, Hansen, and the Dateline television crew arrived at Conradt’s house, he shot himself in the head and died within 60 minutes. In the aftermath, the legality of the methods used by To Catch a Predator and the watchdog organization it worked with, Perverted-Justice, were called into question.

To Catch a Predator itself was cancelled just a few years later in 2008, with Hansen ultimately launching a sort-of sequel series in 2016 titled Hansen vs. Predator. The show’s ethics were also examined in a 2025 documentary titled Predators. Again, there’s no telling at this point if that is the plot of Primetime… but either way, the movie is shaping up to be something really interesting.

The film is the narrative feature film debut of Lance Oppenheim, who previously helmed the buzzy documentaries Ren Faire and Some Kind of Heaven. The cast of Primetime also includes Skyler Gisondo (Superman, The Righteous Gemstones), Merritt Wever (Unbelievable, The Walking Dead), Matthew Maher (Our Flag Means Death, Captain Marvel), Anna Faris (Scary Movie, The House Bunny), Sean Bridgers (Deadwood, The Thing About Pam), and musician Phoebe Bridgers in her feature film debut.

Primetime is set to be released exclusively in theaters later this fall.

(featured image: A24)

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