Christopher Reeve Admitted He Was Thankful Not to Be Paralyzed After Shooting “Above Suspicion”. Days Later, He'd Become Quadriplegic
Christopher Reeve Admitted He Was Thankful Not to Be Paralyzed After Shooting “Above Suspicion”. Days Later, He'd Become Quadriplegic
Angela AndaloroTue, May 26, 2026 at 5:09 PM UTC
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Christopher Reeve in "Above Suspicion"
Credit: Moviestore/Shutterstock
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Christopher Reeve was paralyzed in 1995 when he was thrown from his horse during an equestrian competition, resulting in a severe spinal cord injury
Days before the accident, Reeve's latest project, a TV movie called Above Suspicion, debuted
The role required Reeve to visit a rehab center and learn about being a paraplegic, with the actor unaware he would end up a quadriplegic himself
Christopher Reeve's accident was an unforeseeable tragedy that forever altered the talented actor's life.
The thought of living with a disability was on Reeve's mind before the accident came to pass. The actor, then 42, had spent time at a rehab center, researching paraplegics for his role in Above Suspicion. The 1995 TV movie had Reeve portraying a paralyzed police officer.
Six days after the film premiered, the subject matter became real life for Reeve, who was thrown from his horse and landed on his head, resulting in a severe spinal cord injury that left him paralyzed from the neck down. The injury rendered him dependent on a ventilator to breathe and drastically altered his life.
Reeve reflected on it while appearing on The Oprah Winfrey Show in 1998, with his wife, Dana. The two had been married just three years when the accident took place.
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Christopher Reeve and wife Dana in an interview in Sept. 1995
Credit: Evan Agostini/Liaison
"I remember the last movie I did, I played a paraplegic. A movie called Above Suspicion. I went to a rehab center, and I worked with the people there so I could simulate being a paraplegic, and every day, I'd get my car and drive away and go, 'Thank god that's not me.' And then seven months later, I was in this condition."
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He continued, "I remember, in a way, the smugness of that, as if I was, you know, privileged in some way. But the point is, we're all one great big happy family and any one of us could get hurt at any moment," he continued.
"That taught me a really big lesson about complacency. We should never walk by somebody in a wheelchair and be afraid of them or think of them as a stranger. It could be us. In fact, it is us."
Dana Reeve and Christopher Reeve
Credit: Ron Galella/Getty
Shortly after his injury, Dana and Reeve turned to the American Paralysis Association, which was a key player in spinal cord research, for support and raised funds for the organization. By 1999, the nonprofit was renamed the Christopher Reeve Foundation to reflect their immeasurable efforts, according to the organization’s website.
"He refused to believe that it was impossible for people with spinal injuries to recover, and nobody was spending very much money on spinal injuries," Jane Seymour, a close friend and costar of Reeve, told PEOPLE in March 2024. "They just gave up on them, and he just said, 'No, no. Go do something about it.' "
Reeve died in 2004 from cardiac arrest at a hospital near his home in Westchester County, N.Y.
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