People, Jan. 14, 1980

He always was an authoritarian film director and, on television, an acerbic mystery-show host. But advancing age has banked some of the old fire, and at 80, Sir Alfred Hitchcock is likely to be, as Chaucer put it, "a verray parfit gentil knight." Hitchcock's name as Knight Commander of the British Empire appeared on Queen Elizabeth II's New Year's honors list, the only show-biz personality knighted this year. Fittingly, he received formal notification of the honor at a ceremony in the commissary at Universal City Studios. Why, Hitchcock was asked, had it taken...

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