'Superman’ star, who is the subject of a new documentary 'Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story,' was paralyzed from the neck down in a near-fatal 1995 horseback riding accident
Christopher Reeve wanted to die after accident but found ‘purpose’ through the love of his family: director
"Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story" co-director Peter Ettedgui told Fox News Digital that Reeve’s wife, children and friend Robin Williams made the actor realize he wanted to live after becoming paralyzed.
After Christopher Reeve's life-changing fall from a horse in 1995, the actor underwent a risky operation to save his life.
"It was touch and go to whether he was going to come out of that operation alive," Peter Ettedgui, co-director of "Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story," told Fox News Digital.
Ettedgui continued, "For us, that was ground zero for the entire story, because obviously, when he then finally did come round, you know, his first thought was just ‘Please just switch off life support.’"
But thanks to the love of his wife, Dana, and his children, the support of his two oldest children’s mother, Gae Exton, and close friend and former roommate Robin Williams coming around to "make him laugh," he began to find a "purpose" to live.
CHRISTOPHER REEVE REVEALS WIFE'S WORDS THAT SAVED MY LIFE AFTER TRAGIC ACCIDENT: DOCUMENTARY:
Through the love of his family, Reeve began to find a "purpose" to live after his accident, the director said. (Warner Bros. Pictures/Getty Images; Theo Wargo/WireImage)
"And that, to us, was just the most beautiful story. You start at the worst point you can possibly imagine, and then you go on this quite beautiful journey, I think," he said.
Ettedgui said that "learning the extent" and "depth" of Reeve’s friendship with Williams was a revelation for the filmmakers while making the documentary.
Reeve and Williams became close friends when they roomed together at Julliard in the 1970s, and their friendship lasted until Reeve's death in 2004.
WATCH: Christopher Reeve wanted to die after accident but found ‘purpose’ through the love of his family: director
Reeve once told Katie Couric on "Today" that Williams was the "first one to show up down in Virginia when I was really in trouble."
He joked that it's good he wears a seat belt in his chair, "because I would have fallen out laughing" during one of the comedian's visits. "It's funny, in the middle of a tragedy like this, in the middle of a recuperation, you can still experience genuine joy and laughter and love, and anybody who says life is not worth living is totally wrong."
Robin Williams were friends from the time they roomed together at Julliard until his death in 2004. (Richard Corkery/NY Daily News Archive via Getty Images)
Williams continued to visit Reeve, and even bought his family a special van that he could take to the Academy Awards less than a year after the accident, according to the Mercury News.
Williams spoke at his funeral in 2004, calling him his "brother" and a steady rock for him amid his "chaos."
"Super/Man: The Christopher Reeves Story" co-director Ian Bonhote said that they knew "nothing" about Reeve’s widow, Dana Reeve, before they made the documentary "because he was the famous person you knew about or you had details about him. Her – she was completely unknown. And again, that's, I think, because she achieved so much but didn't get the same respect … to her name. We felt it was really important to bring her forward."
Dana and Christopher Reeve married in 1992. She died in 2006, two years after he died in 2004.
WATCH: Christopher Reeve doc director says ‘depth’ of ‘Superman’ actor’s friendship with Robin Williams surprised him
Ettedgui explained that when they started the documentary, they believed it would be about a man who played a superhero onscreen but became a "true hero" in real life.
"What we didn't realize was that behind that, there was a quite remarkable family," Ettedgui added. "And at a certain point, we realized we were making a film about the entire family, not just about Christopher."
Bonhote said that they had met his kids via Zoom a couple of times, but when they actually met them in person, all three kids reminded them of Reeve in a different way.
"What we didn't realize was that behind that, there was a quite remarkable family, and at a certain point, we realized we were making a film about the entire family, not just about Christopher."
— "Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story" co-director Peter Ettedgui
"Superman" star Christopher Reeve, who died in 2004 after becoming paralyzed in 1995, is the subject of a new documentary. (Warner Brothers/courtesy Everett Collection)
Will Reeve, 32, is an ABC correspondent, Alexandra, 40, is the CEO of a nonprofit organization, and Matthew, 44, is a filmmaker.
"Will is an entertainer," Bonhote said. "He loves the camera. He loves the performance. He wasn't – he says it himself, he was never going to be an actor, but, you know, he's in front of the camera almost every day in his life as a reporter for ‘Good Morning America.’ Alexandra is an activist, and she runs – she's a CEO of an NGO [non-governmental organization] in Washington. And Matthew is a filmmaker. So it’s funny he almost split himself within three people."
He added, "That's how we used them so much in the film. They were the best, you know, they were the best people to convey Chris, the sense of Chris."
Will Reeve called it a "privilege" to have their life made into a movie.
WATCH: Christopher Reeve doc director hopes fans are inspired by film: ‘Life doesn’t come to an end’ after loss
"Peter and Ian, our directors, told a very human story in such a big, cinematic way, and it's such a privilege to have your own life, your own family's story turned into a movie, a documentary, and to see it down so well is a treat," he said while sitting with his siblings in a recent interview with Fox News.
Christopher Reeve with his wife, Dana, son Will, and Robin Williams in 2004. (Evan Agostini/Getty Images)
Bonhote said he was also surprised by Reeve’s level of activism after his injury.
"He got to know everything about spinal cord injuries, and he just taught himself so much about the research available, what could be improved, and actually went on that journey of raising so much money, awareness," he said.
Bonhote explained that when he and Ettedgui started playing with the film’s structure, "we felt that elements had an element of superheroic powers, but in a real-life setting. And that's how we kind of triggered the idea of just always using, you know, Superman and a metaphor of Superman throughout the film by his newfound powers, in a way."
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In the documentary, Reeve’s surgeon described essentially having to put the actor’s head back on his body in the emergency surgery after his accident.
Bonhote explained that the surgery’s outcome – being able to walk out of the hospital or dying right away – was a difference of a millimeter in the surgery.
He added, "even how they managed to keep him alive was already groundbreaking surgery and groundbreaking medicine."
24-year-old Christopher Reeve plays the comic-book hero as he mends a broken railway track in a scene from the film "Superman." (Keystone/Getty Images)
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Reeve was an avid horseback rider and competitor and was in a horse jumping contest on the day of his accident.
Along with horseback riding, Reeve – who stood 6 feet, 4 inches and had a muscular build – enjoyed other sports like sailing, skiing and scuba diving, and he was a pilot who flew solo across the Atlantic twice.
He also often performed his own stunts on set, according to the New York Times.
Immediately after Reeve fell headfirst off of a horse during a competition in Virginia in May 1995, Ettedgui said that no one realized how serious it was because it wasn’t a big jump.
"And the commentator, we wish – there’s no footage of this, unfortunately – but the commentator goes, "Superman is down’ as though it was something of a, you know, a joke. And then sort of like the realization dawned on everyone what had happened. And then, you know, the story of the rush of having him being airlifted to hospital and the surgery."
Ettedgui said they believe the emergency surgery performed on Reeve had never been done before, "and they actually had to sort of like rehearse it on a corpse in order to really refine what they were going to do in the operation."
Matthew Reeve told Fox News that despite everything his father went through, "He was still very much him, the same person throughout it. And the intensity and passion and commitment that he brought to acting as well as to his hobbies he carried through to his advocacy work and running the foundation and raising money for research."
Reeve's children Matthew, Alexandra and Will were an integral part of the documentary, the directors said. (Michael Loccisano/Getty Images)
Alexandra added, "We’re excited about telling this story to a new generation of people, too. Both people who aren’t as familiar with him or knew him as the hero onscreen but may not have realized the man behind that and the depth of our story."
Reeve landed "Superman," the breakout role of his career in his mid 20s. The Julliard-trained actor also played the superhero in the 1978 film's sequels: "Superman II," "Superman III" and "Superman IV" in 1980, 1983 and 1987.
He was also known for 1980's "Somewhere in Time," as well as directing the Emmy-nominated "In the Gloaming" for HBO in 1997 after his paralysis and for starring in the Jimmy Stewart role in a 1998 "Rear Window" remake. The part won him a Screen Actors Guild Award.
As far as what Ettedgui wants audiences to take away from the film, he says it’s "multifaceted."
"We're all going to have to confront loss, illness, maybe disability, you know, we're all going to lose people that we love," he said. "And I think that this is a story about those things, but about how life doesn't come to an end and how you can kind of like take that in your stride."
