The actor told ABC News that he almost died after a 14,000-pound plow ran him over in January.
The actor Jeremy Renner, who was severely injured on Jan. 1 when a heavy snow plow ran over him, said in a TV interview set to be broadcast on Thursday night that he had been trying to save his nephew when the truck hit him, breaking more than 30 bones.
Mr. Renner, an Oscar-nominated actor who is perhaps best known for his role as Hawkeye in the Marvel Avengers movie and TV franchise, spoke publicly at length about his frightening experience and arduous recovery for the first time in an interview with ABC News, which will air at 10 p.m. Eastern time.
“I’ve lost a lot of flesh and bone in this experience,” Mr. Renner told the journalist Diane Sawyer. “But I’ve been refueled and refilled with love and titanium.”
In interview clips that were released in advance, Mr. Renner appeared to still be in shock over what had occurred to him and struggled to hold back tears at times as he recalled details after the accident, like the moment he told his family from the hospital in sign language, “I’m sorry.”
As he lay in the hospital, Mr. Renner, who has since been released, said he would wonder: “What’s my body look like? Am I just going to be like a spine and a brain like a science experiment?” While in critical condition, Mr. Renner said, he wrote a goodbye note to his family on his phone.
The network also posted clips before the broadcast that showed different phases of his recovery, including Mr. Renner in a wheelchair doing leg exercises. A video posted on Twitter shows him in recovery doing an exercise that helps him regain the strength to walk. Another video from Jan. 5 shows Mr. Renner in the hospital, his face swollen and bruised.
On Jan. 1, Mr. Renner, 52, was using his snow plow, which weighs more than 14,000 pounds, to tow his car on a snowed-in private road near his home in Reno, Nev., the Washoe County Sheriff’s Office said in a news conference. A family member had been driving the car and had gotten stuck.
After they successfully towed the car, Mr. Renner got off the plow, which then began to roll, the sheriff’s office said. Mr. Renner had tried to get back into the plow’s driver’s seat to stop the rolling vehicle, but he was run over, the sheriff’s office said.
In a brief clip of the ABC News interview, Mr. Renner said he would put himself through the experience again because the plow had been “going right at my nephew,” whose age he did not share.
In a recording of the 911 call made that day, a man can be heard saying of Mr. Renner, “He’s been crushed.”
In the background of that call, Mr. Renner can be heard moaning as the man who contacted 911 says, “There’s a lot of blood over here,” and tells Mr. Renner: “Keep breathing man, keep fighting. Hang in there, brother.”
Mr. Renner revealed the extent of his injuries in the interview: dozens of broken bones, including eight ribs, his right knee and ankle and right shoulder; a collapsed lung; and a liver pierced by a rib bone.
When asked in the interview if he sees the same face when looking in the mirror, Mr. Renner replied, “I see a lucky man.”
Source: Movies - nytimes.com
