Born: ?, Paris, France, as Robert S. Hahn. Came to the USA when he was 3 months old and grew up in New York City.

Education: Film School of New York University [NYU]; American Film Institute [AFI], Los Angeles [graduated in 1974].

Career: Met Amy Heckerling at NYU; they worked together on numerous award-winning short films. They both attended the American Film Institute.

'I was on Owen Roizman's crew for 20-plus years as assistant and operator. I think getting my first feature film ['The Electric Horseman'] as a second assistant cameraman working for Owen Roizman was an amazing experience. I revered Owen's work when I was attending NYU and here I was working on his crew! I couldn't believe it.

'I was called for my availability to operate 'In & Out'. Wanting to move up, and knowing that Scott Rudin was producing [I had worked for him on 'The Addams Family'], I asked to be considered as DP. I met with Frank Oz and the first thing he said to me was, "I hear you're a jerk to work with." Without missing a beat, I said, "First-class." From that moment, we both knew we had the same sense of humor. After our very enjoyable meeting, he called me three days later and said, "Well, you don't have a reel, you've never really done anything of note before... I'd like you to shoot my film!" He said he was going on instinct. Of course I was jumping out of my seat with excitement, but also really scared. Thankfully, the chemistry we had in our meeting lasted for the entire shoot and continues to this day.

'We question each other about our expectations based on the script, then try to reference existing films. When we were preparing 'The Score' we watched 'Touch of Evil'. I've always loved that film, so it was a real pleasure to use Orson Welles' masterpiece as our touchstone. Frank told me to be as bold as I wanted and he would support me. He said not to be afraid to go dark and he also said it wasn't always necessary to see the actors' eyes. That was it. I never heard any more comments about the lighting except during dailies [which thankfully, were always a pleasurable experience].

'Frank was less specific with me about the look of 'The Stepford Wives' than he was with 'The Score'. During location scouting we often talked in general terms about the feeling of the film before and after the characters move to Stepford [cool, blue colors before, warm rich colors after], but it didn't get more detailed than that. He really left the visuals to me. Working with the art and wardrobe departments, I strove to keep the 'real' world of Joanna icy and cool and the 'idyllic' Stepford world very colorful. We all agreed that Stepford should be a place you'd want to live in. Still, that didn't mean the look had to be bright all the time. Though our film is lighter in tone than the original 'The Stepford Wives' [1974; ph by Owen Roizman], I felt that didn't preclude going darker as the story progressed. I should add that I purposely didn't look at Owen's version of the film. I wanted to create my own take on the story and didn't want to be subconsciously influenced by what he had done on the original. Also, the tone of the remake was so different that it didn't seem appropriate to reference the first film.' [From interview with Jennifer M. Wood in 'MovieMaker'.]

Note: Some sources credit Rob Hahn with co-dir & cph of the doc series 'Journeys to Other Worlds' [filmed February 1983-June 1986 during the 'Around the Tropic World' Expedition], but credit is due to Robert 'Rio' Gregory Hahn, explorer, filmmaker and  co-founder of the Global Ecotechnics Corporation.