"I was trying to mould the part to be the best part to play for somebody else, and then I got more and more attached to it," Pattinson said on Saturday at the Venice Film Festival, where the film had its world premiere and sparked a nine-minute standing ovation.
The 40-year-old English actor started out as a producer on the film about the NBC Dateline show To Catch a Predator. But while he and his collaborators found that they couldn't help but imitate Hansen while chatting about the project, he "found his accent very difficult".
"This more than any other part that I've done, just grunt work," Pattinson said.
He was also part of the reason directing duties went to Lance Oppenheim, who had only directed documentaries up until this point.
Oppenheim knew of Chris Hansen and was interested in the phenomenon he'd created. However, something clicked into place when Oppenheim's wife gifted him a Cameo video and he saw Hansen performing as himself.
"To me this was a great character, a great subject," Oppenheim said.
"A person who became a persona … a person who embraced the meme of himself."
Primetime has already inspired discourse and headlines with just its trailer and subject matter.
It's based on journalist Luke Dittrich's Esquire article "Tonight on Dateline This Man Will Die", which explores a 2006 sting operation on Texas assistant district attorney Bill Conradt. He died by suicide as police officers descended on his home with the show's television cameras outside.
Oppenheim, in his director's statement, said that he "wanted to trace the disparate ambitions of people who existed inside this apparatus - a journalistic crusader, a mercenary TV producer and a wide-eyed Hollywood dreamer - converging into a moment of crisis".
Hansen was not involved in the making of the movie and has made several public comments about it, including that he had always thought Denis Leary should have played him and questioning the motives of the filmmakers.
He was invited to see the movie before the festival, but took issue with the NDA he was asked to sign beforehand. There are also reports that he's bought advertising to play in front of Primetime theatrical showings when it's in theatres starting on September 25.
When asked to comment on the ads, Pattinson said he just hopes that Hansen likes the movie.
"The more you watch the show, there's something magnetic about his presence," Pattinson said.
"Something he's doing is the reason why people are still talking about that show 20 years later."
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