Nation Honors Eastwood, Chuck Berry

By Stephen M. Silverman

Thursday August 06, 1998 12:00 AM EDT

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Filmmaker Clint Eastwood, 70, and rock legend Chuck Berry, 73, are the only two American-born recipients of this year's Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts honors for outstanding American performers, notes The New York Times. The other honorees for the 22nd annual event are Latvian-born ballet dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov, 52, Spanish-born opera tenor Placido Domingo, 59, and British-born actress Angela Lansbury, 74. The Times also points out that Berry is the first recipient to have served time in prison (for two years, on a morals charge that involved an underage girl in his St. Louis nightclub). The awards will be presented on Dec. 3, and usually include an appearance by the President. Asked how she felt when she got the news yesterday that she was going to get the award, Lansbury, this year's only woman to be named, told The Washington Post, "I was blown away by it."