Robert Pattinson is having a very busy 2026.
He’s already co-starred with Zendaya in the A24 hit “The Drama,” has Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey” coming this summer and, before the end of the year, will appear in both Denis Villeneuve’s “Dune: Part Three” and Fernando Meirelles’ “Here Comes the Flood” alongside Denzel Washington. Somewhere in there he’ll also be see in “Primetime,” again for A24, playing American television journalist Chris Hansen, who appeared on “Dateline” and then, later, his own show “To Catch a Predator.” You can watch the nerve-jangling first trailer below.
If you’ve never seen “To Catch a Predator” or its “Dateline” segments, it usually involved Hansen working with local law enforcement officers to entrap a suspected predator, setting up a sting operation to get the potential offender into a house. That’s when the person is confronted by Hansen and cops, who ask what they intended to do after communicating with an underage boy or girl, usually via the Internet. The “Dateline” segment gained huge popularity, but the spinoff series only lasted for 20 episodes on NBC.
The “To Catch a Predator” series famously ended with one of the “suspects” committing suicide while police officers and camera crews waited outside. (The footage is absolutely horrifying.) Following the incident, the show was promptly canceled and the series received major criticism, claims of staged events and lawsuits. Several investigations into the series followed, but Hansen remained undeterred, launching several “To Catch a Predator”-style follow-ups in the years since.
Last year “Predators,” a documentary by David Osit, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and later aired on Paramount+. The doc looked at the phenomenon surrounding the series and about Hansen’s continued efforts to maintain the brand, while second-tier operations try to keep its spirit alive. It was pretty icky.
“Primetime,” however, was directed by documentarian Lance Oppenheim and produced by (among others) Pattinson, Ari Aster and Aster’s partner Lars Knudsen. Skyler Gisondo, Merritt Weaver, Anna Faris and Phoebe Bridgers also star.
“Primetime” hits theaters this fall.
