WOODWARD SET FOR ‘MENAGERIE’

Paul Newman will direct Joanne Woodward in a feature-film version of Tennessee Williams’ play “The Glass Menagerie,” Woodward’s office confirmed here Monday.

The film, which is to be financed and distributed worldwide by the New York-based Vista Organization Ltd., is expected to start shooting early next fall. It will mark the first joint venture for the married couple since Newman directed Woodward in the 1980 TV movie “The Shadow Box.” Newman previously directed Woodward in the 1972 film “The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds” and in the 1968 film “Rachel Rachel,” for which the actress received an Academy Award nomination.

In the film version of Williams’ memory play about the Wingfield family of St. Louis, Woodward will re-create the role of Amanda Wingfield that she played in a critically acclaimed recent production of the play staged at the Long Wharf Theater in New Haven, Conn.

According to Woodward’s office, the entire Long Wharf cast will join her in the film. They are Treat Williams and Karen Allen as the Wingfield children, and James Naughton as the Gentleman Caller.