A NEW MISSION FOR BOB HOPE : LEGENDARY COMEDIAN SCALING BACK TO DEVOTE TIME TO COMEDY MUSEUM.

Byline: R.D. Heldenfels Knight-Ridder Tribune News Wire

Last summer, Bob Hope came back to his Cleveland hometown to help celebrate the bicentennial - of the city, not Hope, who is only 93.

One stop was the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum. While you can imagine Hope doing a monologue about rock greats (``Hey, what a-BOUT this Michael Jackson, huh?''), the museum left him ``very enthused,'' daughter Linda Hope said.

Hope has long wanted to establish a museum of comedy, said Linda. ``After seeing your Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ... he was determined to get on the stick with his own museum.''

But where does someone find the energy for such an undertaking, especially someone who's been working since before World War I? Well, you have to cut back somewhere, and Hope has decided to cut back on TV.

At 8 p.m. Saturday on NBC (Channel 4), the one-hour special ``Bob Hope ... Laughing With the Presidents'' officially ends Hope's 58-year relationship with the Peacock Network, the last 46 on TV.

Although there's been talk about NBC pushing Hope away, Linda - who is executive producer of the special and vice president of Hope Enterprises - said the decision was her father's.

She admits Hope has slowed down. ``His eyesight is not great, so it's hard for him to read (cue) cards,'' she said. That's noticeable in the special, where Hope looks far more comfortable just reminiscing about the presidents he's met than he does in prearranged patter with co-host Tony Danza.

At the same time, she said, ``It's very cute how he gets when he works. At 93, once he hears the music and sees the lights, he gets himself up for it. He loves it.''

A while back, Hope went with his wife, Dolores, to a taping for a PBS special on bandleader Les Brown. The special focused on Brown's music, so Hope went along with Dolores, a former singer, mainly to see Brown.

``He got in there and said, `I want to do something,' '' Linda said. ``My mother said, ``You're a comedian.' And he said, `Well, hell, I can sing, too.' ''

As for the NBC deal, Linda said, ``NBC has been absolutely terrific. This is a very amicable parting.''

Originally scheduled for August, the special, after Hope's decision, was moved to the more heavily viewed November schedule ``to give him a proper send-off,'' she said.

``Laughing With the Presidents'' is hardly a career retrospective, or even a showcase for Hope at his best (that's in his big-screen comedies). It does provide one indication of Hope's celebrity, since he has met every president since Franklin D. Roosevelt and slept at the White House many times.

The special goes back to radio and newsreels, along with pieces of Hope's TV monologues, to cover more than 50 years of tweaks of chief executives. (There's also a new book, ``Bob Hope's Dear Prez, I Wanna Tell Ya!'' a collection of jokes and reminiscences.)

Hope adds his own thoughts, as do some of the celebrities who have worked with Hope, such as Don Johnson. You also hear from President Clinton, former presidents Ford and Bush, and David and Julie Nixon Eisenhower - Ike's grandson and Nixon's daughter. You even get a blooper reel as George and Barbara Bush try to tell a story about Hope.

It's an affectionate hour, and one in which Linda Hope sees how some of her father's work evolved.

``What I thought was most interesting in looking at all the material was the change in his attitude as he approached the different presidents,'' she said. ``He was a little more tentative back in the days when he did his first show for Franklin Roosevelt. Every head was turning, looking back at Roosevelt, to see how he was reacting. Comedians didn't take potshots at presidents then. There was a whole different attitude.''

As time went on, Hope realized that the presidents actually enjoyed his jabs. And Linda says Hope always respected the importance of the presidency.

In the movie ``Forrest Gump,'' Gump sums up his third trip to the White House with a weary, ``I went - again. And I met the president of the United States - again.'' Linda said her father was never that jaded.

``Not in the slightest. There was always an excitement. He enjoyed a close personal relationship with the Fords and the Reagans, because he'd known them a long time before they were ever presidents. But he's said himself that it's a very special thing to stay in the White House.''

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2 Photos

Photo: (1) President Nixon and Bob Hope go nose to nose in a comedy bit from tonight's ``Bob Hope ... Laughing With the Presidents.''

(2) Actor Tony Danza, left, joins Hope for tonight's special, which highlights the comedian's funny moments with U.S. presidents. It's Hope's last special under contract to NBC.