NEWS LITE : KUDROW: NO ENVY AMONG `FRIENDS'.

Lisa Kudrow stays friends with her television co-stars no matter who outshines who on the silver screen.

``We're not competitive at all,'' Kudrow said of her ``Friends'' cast mates in Wednesday's New York Daily News. ``We don't buy into that. We can't wait to tell each other how great the other is doing.''

Jennifer Aniston's new movie, ``The Object of My Affection,'' was No. 2 at the box office in its debut weekend, and Matt LeBlanc's ``Lost in Space'' is No. 3 after three weeks.

Kudrow has two movies due out next month: ``The Opposite of Sex'' and ``Clockwatchers.''

Hilfiger taking flight with designer blimp 

New Yorkers are known for their sky-high ambitions, but a designer blimp?

Tommy Hilfiger is going for it, launching a 196-foot zeppelin with his name on it to tout a new line of sportswear.

The high-tech balloon - apparently the first-ever ``designer'' blimp - will share airspace with others owned by Fuji and, of course, Goodyear, New York magazine reported in its April 27 edition.

The Hilfiger aircraft is expected to appear this summer over various events around the country.

Goldberg likes both feet on the ground

Given that she used to handle dead people every day, you might think Whoopi Goldberg couldn't be freaked out.

Not so. Put the actress on a plane, and she shakes with fear. And traveling overland is using up a lot of her time. She just spent two days on a private bus from Los Angeles to New York because she can't stand taking flight.

``I'll fly when there's no other choice, but I dread it. I panic, I shake, I break out in a sweat, I cry and moan,'' she told Britain's Daily Telegraph. ``It's just awful and I know it isn't rational, but that's the way I feel.''

Before Goldberg found fame and considerable fortune, starring in movies like ``Ghost'' and ``Sister Act,'' one of her previous jobs was at a funeral parlor, giving the dead a final makeover.

``The money was good,'' she said. ``You made your own hours, you were left to yourself pretty much and the customer rarely talked back.''

BEST OF OL' BLUE EYES; Sinatra fans frank in naming best songs

It's not surprising that former astronaut Buzz Aldrin's favorite Frank Sinatra song is ``Fly Me To The Moon.'' But why does Jack Lemmon like ``In The Wee Small Hours of the Morning''?

``I was courting my wife, Felicia, and we played it constantly,'' Lemmon explained.

It's also entertainer Bruce Hornsby's favorite: ``I have twin boys, age 6, and for the last four or five years I have sung this song to them as a lullaby when they're going to sleep.''

Sinatra fans' favorites are being collected for a ``Thank Frank'' book that will be presented during a celebration of the entertainer May 28-31 in Las Vegas. The event includes a charity golf tournament that benefits the Barbara Sinatra Children's Center at the Eisenhower Medical Center.

``NYPD Blue'' star Dennis Franz picked ``Strangers in the Night,'' and baseball manager Davey Johnson likes ``New York, New York.''

``I went to New York and made it to the top of baseball in 1986 with the Mets,'' he said. ``I have chills when I hear Frank sing, `New York, New York.' ''

Singers criticize USDA food label plan

Singers Willie Nelson, Neil Young and John Mellencamp added their voices Wednesday to those of thousands of people urging the Agriculture Department not to permit such practices as irradiation or genetic engineering in organic foods.

The three entertainers, who are affiliated with the Farm Aid group that supports small farms, are among more than 115,000 people who have written, faxed or e-mailed comments about USDA's proposed organic rules.

``We have received more comments on this rule than on any rule in the history of the Department of Agriculture in modern times,'' said Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman.

The letters from Nelson, Young and Mellencamp focused on the main reasons for the uproar: The department left open the possibility that it would let products be labeled as organic even if they were genetically altered, irradiated to kill microbes or grown on land fertilized with human waste.

Carters askforgiveness

for Fonda

Former President Jimmy Carter and wife Rosalynn have forgiven Jane Fonda, and they're asking others to do the same.

Fonda incurred the wrath of the governor and other Georgians when she recently described some parts of the state as a backwater.

``Having worked with her on issues of concern to Georgia's least fortunate, we know that she does not deserve the vituperative condemnation she has received,'' the Carters said in a letter in Wednesday's Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Fonda apologized for likening parts of Georgia to Third World countries during remarks she made last week to a U.N. group in New York.

While some said Fonda was just telling it like it is, Gov. Zell Miller chastised her.

``Maybe the view from your penthouse apartment is not as clear as it needs to be,'' Miller wrote.

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

CAPTION(S):

7 Photos

PHOTO (1 -- 3) Buzz Aldrin, Jack Lemmon and Dennis Franz named their favorite Frank Sinatra songs for a tribute.

(4) Carter

(5) Goldberg

(6) Hilfiger

(7) Kudrow