Christopher Reeve Interview: A Hero Onscreen and Of

Just months before his untimely death and nearly a decade after his tragic accident, Christopher Reeve spoke one last time with Reader's Digest about his personal struggles, keeping up hope, and his frustrations with the current administration's opposition to stem cell research.

Nothing Is Impossible

Christopher Reeve, a hero onscreen as Superman and in real
life as an activist for stem cell research, passed away on
October 10 at age 52. Just months before, Mr. Reeve spoke
with our magazine for an interview that appeared in our
October 2004 issue.
Read the interview here, and check out exclusive outtakes from the interview only seen here at rd.com.

"It doesn't feel like a hospital here, does it?" says Christopher Reeve, his eyes sweeping the office in the quietly elegant home that he shares with his wife, Dana, and their 12-year-old son, Will. "That's because Dana, from the very beginning, wanted our family to live as normal a life as possible."

The "beginning" was May 27, 1995, the day the athletic actor, an accomplished rider, approached a routine three-foot jump in a Virginia horse show. His chestnut Thoroughbred balked and stopped short, and Reeve, his hands tangled in the bridle, catapulted headfirst onto the ground.

The injury rendered Reeve, now 52, a quadriplegic, confined to a ventilator and a wheelchair -- and initially contemplating suicide. But he titled his second memoir Nothing Is Impossible, and has spent the years since proving that point. Reeve works fiercely on his rehabilitation and has regained sensation over 70 percent of his body. He can go for long periods without his ventilator (he had electrodes implanted in his abdomen to help him breathe on his own). And he has stunned doctors by willing himself to move one of his fingers, and, in water, his legs and arms.

Reeve has labored tirelessly on legislation for spinal cord injury patients: His Christopher Reeve Paralysis Act goes before Congress this fall. And he hasn't put his creative life aside either. On October 25, A&E will air his second directorial project, "The Brooke Ellison Story," the real-life saga of an 11-year-old girl paralyzed from the neck down as the result of an auto accident.

• • Amazing People
• Actors

• Christopher Reeve Bio on biography.com
• 
• Remembering The Reeves
• A family friend's intimate portrait of a remarkable love.
• 
• The Brooke Ellison Story
• A screech of brakes, a small body flying through the air -- and 11-year-old Brooke Ellison couldn't move or even breathe on her own. But the story was just beginning.
• 
• Robin Williams Grows Up (Just a Little)
• He's unscripted. He's uncensored. And you can expect the unexpected.
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