October 11, 2004. Copyright, 2004, Graphic News. All rights reserved

Actor Christopher Reeve dies

LONDON, October 11, Graphic News: Christopher Reeve, the actor best known for playing ÒSuperman,Ó and whose near-fatal riding accident nine years ago turned him into a worldwide advocate for spinal cord research, died Sunday of heart failure.

Reeve, 52, fell into a coma Saturday after going into cardiac arrest while at his New York home.

In May, 1995, he suffered multiple injuries including two shattered neck vertebrae when he was thrown from his horse at an equestrian event. Enduring months of therapy to allow him to breathe for longer and longer periods without a respirator, Reeve emerged to lobby Congress for better insurance protection against catastrophic injury and to move an Academy Award audience to tears with a call for more films about social issues.

Reeve returned to directing, and even returned to acting in a 1998 production of ÒRear Window,Ó a modern update of the Hitchcock thriller about a man in a wheelchair who becomes convinced a neighbour has been murdered. Reeve won a Screen Actors Guild award for best actor in a television movie or mini-series.

In 2002, doctors described as ÒremarkableÓ the progress by Reeve, who told People magazine he was able to breathe for up to 90 minutes without a ventilator, and Òcan feelÓ the hugs of wife Dana and his children.

In former days the actor was an outdoorsman who rode, sailed and flew his own planes. He was also an accomplished pianist and political activist whose campaigning experience on liberal causes prepared him for perhaps his greatest role.

Since 1995 he worked tirelessly for the disabled, campaigning for more money for research into spinal cord injuries and embryonic stem cell treatment. His achievements in films such as ÒThe Remains of the DayÓ and ÒThe BostoniansÓ were eclipsed by his sheer determination to improve his own life and those of others. His 1998 autobiography ÒStill MeÓ won plaudits for its honesty and courage.

/ENDS