Harry Belafonte Falls Sick On His Way To Receiving Honor

Harry Belafonte, the activist and performer, was en route to receiving an honor at the Four Seasons Restaurant when he was struck ill Thursday night.

The 88-year-old rallied and called in his regrets, but skipped the reception.

The Harlem-born "King of Calypso" was to be honored at the Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation's Restore Brooklyn Annual Benefit Gala.

Instead of receiving the honor in person, Belafonte, who was one of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s closest friends and an early and constant activist for civil rights, said he deeply regretted missing the gala.

He was connected by speaker phone to the crowd. "I was in the lobby of my building, just about the step into the car to bring me to the celebration, when I had a seizure," according to a People reporter in attendance.

Belafonte, who has won three Grammy Awards, an Emmy, a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, a Tony and a Kennedy Center Honor, told the surprised crowd at the fund-raiser that he deeply regretted missing the celebration.

"Every joint in my body went into disarray. I felt that rather than rely on… all the things I could not control, I thought it was in everybody's best interest I just try to not show up" he said.

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. was presenting an award to Belafonte, and reminisced about meeting Belafonte when he was a child.

"He was a regular guest at my house, a very close friend of my parents, one of the few people who played tennis as competitively as they did," People reported Kennedy as saying. "He was originally introduced to my family in May of 1962 because he was a guest at my uncle, President Kennedy's, birthday party and he was put there by Martin Luther King."

The Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation works with residents and businesses to improve the quality of life in central Brooklyn, and is the nation's first community development corporation.

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