Chris Hanley is a celebrated producer of independent cinema. His production company, Muse Productions, is best known for crafting critically acclaimed features such as Mary Harron’s American Psycho, Sofia Coppola’s directorial debut Virgin Suicides, and director Vincent Gallo’s Buffalo 66. Hanley has demonstrated a sophisticated and prolific approach to filmmaking, with 30 feature films produced over the span of his nearly 20 year career.
Educated at Amherst in English literature and philosophy, Hanley brings an intellectual yet accessible and artistic flare to the works that he has produced. Pioneering neurological research on the effects of music on neural pathways during university studies, Hanley seamlessly migrated to music production, forming Intergalactic Music in New York during the early 1970s. In addition to building an inventory of 200,000 of the world’s most collectable guitars supplied to the world’s most prominent musicians, Hanley brought Intergalactic to the forefront of music production recording artists such as the Ramones, Keith Richards, Bob Dylan, Afrika Bamabatta, Bobby Brown, to name a few.
While in New York, Hanley became an avid art collector and dealer and close friends with Andy Warhol, whose work he stockpiled, later paying associates and even raising funds for movies in Warhol art. The influence of Warhol, Basquiat, and others in the New York art scene became apparent as Hanley segued from music to music video production with his company Rock Videos International. In 1991, Hanley formed Muse Productions with his wife Roberta Hanley. Its first outing was the sci-fi actioner Split Second. Starring Rutger Hauer and Kim Cattrall, and featuring special effects by Stephen Norrington, the film (directed by The Burning’s Tony Maylam) has gone on to achieve cult status.
In 1995, Chris Hanley partnered with Nich Wechsler on Steve Buscemi’s directorial debut Trees Lounge, for which Hanley, the director, and producer Brad Wyman received Independent Spirit Award nominations in 1997. The partnership also led to introductions to former Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo bassist Matthew Bright and to Oliver Stone. The resulting project was Freeway, an updating on Little Red Riding Hood, which starred Reese Witherspoon and Kiefer Sutherland. Hanley received another Independent Spirit Award nomination in 1999 (shared with Gallo) for Buffalo ’66. He has since produced Two Girls and a Guy, Bully, Spun, The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things, Edmond, and Downloading Nancy among others. His most recent film as producer is The Killer Inside Me, directed by Michael Winterbottom and starring Casey Affleck, Jessica Alba, and Kate Hudson.
