By E. Graydon Carter

Always ready to tie one of his "specials" to a major event, Bob Hope, 78, took a ringside see of the comparative punches of Heavyweight Champ Larry Holmes, 32, and Challenger Gerry Cooney, 25. Holmes and Cooney do not face off until June 11, but for his NBC show this week, Hope laced up a pair of oversize Everlasts and traded light punches and patter with the fighters. He remembered to keep his guard up from youthful days when he boxed under the name Packy East. Says he: "You don't think I was born with this nose?"

I am troubled somewhat by D.M. 's professional posture. The analyst has fallen in love with E.M., a lovely young actress, and, shades of old Jung, she is his patient! D.M. calls on me for advice from time to time --a bit of effrontery I would normally rebuff if it were not that the whole affair is just for a movie called Lovesick due out next year. Dudley Moore, 47, is the analyst and Elizabeth McGovern, 20, is a delightful choice as his patient. Sir Alec Guinness, 68, is playing me. Since childhood, I have always dreamed of Redford or Newman in, the part, but who am I to analyze a producer's motives?

--S.F.

She argued that it was her accountant's fault, but in 1980, an Italian court nonetheless convicted Sophia Loren, of having failed to pay $4,000 in taxes. She got a $14,200 fine and 30 days in prison. Loren, 47, stayed out of the country to evade the jail sentence (she paid the fine), but last week she finally returned to do her time--tempered by a measure of Italian eleganza. Loren was chauffeured by police in a white Alfa Romeo to Casa Circondariale, a pink-walled women's prison near her native Naples. Carrying a bouquet that could have concealed a good-size hacksaw, Sophia was cheered by fellow inmates as she was escorted to a 10-ft.-sq. cell. Skeptics attributed Loren's homecoming to her planned starring role in a film that starts shooting in Italy next month. But Sophia offered a more Mediterranean explanation: "I want to see my mother and friends." Besides, said she. "I need the Italian sun."

The decision by California's three-member board of prison terms was harsh but expected. Sirhan Sirhan, 38, the lone killer of Senator Robert F. Kennedy in 1968, had earlier been scheduled for parole on Sept. 1, 1984. But public outrage prompted an appeal by the Los Angeles district attorney's office, and after a rehearing at Soledad Prison, the board last week took back the parole date. Sirhan will come up for a new review in November.

Considering the Cyclopean onslaught of photographers the royal family must endure, it is rather a quaint sight to catch them squinting into the lens themselves. Like a good sportsman's wife, Queen Elizabeth II, 56, was front and center to watch Prince Philip, 60, in the three-day Royal Windsor Horse Show's carriage-driving contest. The prince, who started racing coaches at 50 after he gave up polo, has been a runner-up four times in the past, but this year he reined supreme. Presented the first-place trophy by his No. 1 fan, Philip smiled and said: "This was just about the most satisfying win of my driving career." Yes, but would you mind holding still for one more snap, please?

--By E. Graydon Carter

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