NEWS LITE : NAMES IN THE NEWS CULKIN'S FIANCEE DENIES PREGNANCY.

Macaulay Culkin and girlfriend Rachel Miner are getting married, but not because she's pregnant.

New York Post columnist Cindy Adams reported Friday that Miner looks like she's gained weight, and suggested she might be expecting.

Not so, said Miner's publicist, Bob Fennel.

Miner's family issued a statement Friday saying that ``for people to suggest that they are marrying because Rachel is pregnant is unfair.''

``Macaulay and Rachel would like to have children someday, but both agree that now is not the time,'' the statement read.

Miner is a 17-year-old actress who plays Anne Frank's older sister Margot in the current Broadway production of ``The Diary of Anne Frank.'' She and the 17-year-old former ``Home Alone'' star haven't announced a date for their wedding.

DiCaprio set to play psycho killer in film

So Leonardo DiCaprio, heartthrob, is turning coldhearted murderer. And he's bagged his first victim even before filming began.

Leo - all right, DiCaprio - signed on to play the creepy lead in ``American Psycho,'' an adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis' novel about a serial killer in yuppie's clothing. He reportedly will get a career-high $21 million to play the Wall Street trader whose hobbies include committing unspeakably violent acts of torture and dismemberment.

This news was a killer to director Mary Harron, who had spent nearly two years on the screenplay and was ready to film as soon as casting was completed. She didn't want DiCaprio and abandoned the project. Part of DiCaprio's deal includes director approval, so he'll call the shots on the replacement.

Oscar winner Cage says wife won too

Remembering the night he won an Oscar for ``Leaving Las Vegas,'' Nicolas Cage told Movieline magazine that the win meant taking more home than a statuette. His contract for ``Face/Off'' specified that he would get a bonus if he won an Oscar for his earlier movie, ``Leaving Las Vegas,'' because the award would make him more promotable.

``And it just so happened that the bonus they gave me for `Face/Off' was the exact amount of the diamonds'' that Cage's wife, Patricia Arquette, had rented for the evening from Harry Winston.

``So I said, If I win, you're taking something home as well. I won and she's got the diamonds.''

I'll take romance

Runner forsakes title for prom

No young woman has run 1,600 meters faster in Pennsylvania this year than Stacey Vidt.

But instead of competing in the state track championships this weekend in Pittsburgh, the teen-ager will keep a promise to her boyfriend and kick up her heels at the high school prom instead.

``My boyfriend is also my best friend, and I just couldn't look him in the eye a second year and tell him no,'' Vidt said. ``When I went to the state meet last year, part of me wanted to be at the prom.''

Her boyfriend cheered her on last year, when she placed 11th in the 800-meter race.

This year, he's a senior, and Vidt - knowing the two events again would conflict - promised him months ago that he could count on her for Friday night's dance.

Her coach is sympathetic.

``It's a decision no 17-year-old should have to make,'' coach Tom Tobin told the North Hills News-Record. ``She doesn't have anything to prove to myself or anyone else. She deserves to enjoy a prom this year.''

Yet Vidt has been criticized, her home deluged with phone calls questioning her decision.

``People may portray going to a prom as a frivolous decision, but it was very serious. It reduced her to tears,'' said her father, Dr. Louis Vidt. ``She made a commitment to her friend and her friend's family. It's his senior prom; it's a big deal.''

Vidt, a junior, could have raced and danced - but it would have been tight, and Vidt decided that she wouldn't have enjoyed either event under those conditions.

Sheen out of hospital

after OD

Actor Charlie Sheen was released from a Thousand Oaks hospital Friday, one day after his anguished father told the world his son overdosed on drugs.

``He's doing just wonderfully,'' said Kris Carroway-Bowman, spokeswoman for Los Robles Regional Medical Center. ``Hopefully he will go into a rehabilitation program, but he's an adult and that's his choice.''

The fast-living Sheen, 32, star of ``Platoon'' and ``Wall Street,'' renounced his drug and boozing ways two years ago, but early Wednesday overdosed on an undisclosed drug.

Paramedics responded to a 911 call at Sheen's Malibou Lake mansion, where they found him conscious and complaining of tingling in his hands and difficulty in walking.

``This is not an easy moment in our lives, but it's a necessary one,'' his famous father, actor Martin Sheen, said Thursday night. ``Our hope is that he will accept recovery and be fine.''

Charlie Sheen, whose last film was 1997's ``Money Talks,'' has a troubled past.

In 1990 he checked into a drug and alcohol rehabilitation facility, admitting later he had been hooked on booze and drugs.

In 1995 Sheen was sued by a woman who claimed he struck her several times when she refused to have sex.

In early 1996 Sheen announced he planned to divorce model Donna Peele after less than six months of marriage.

News Lite is compiled by Karen Duffy from Daily News staff and wire reports.

CAPTION(S):

4 Photos

Photo: (1) MINER

(2) CAGE

(3) Stacey Vidt heads for the finish line to win the girls' title in October.

(4) SHEEN