SHORT TAKES : Newman, Woodward Just Lucky

What has kept Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward married for 32 years? Eternal love? Undying affection?

Try sheer luck.

The Newmans, breaking a policy of not talking about their marriage, told Parade magazine they don’t know why they have stayed together.

“Our marriage hasn’t been a bed of roses,” Newman said in the magazine’s Sunday issue. “Sometimes you get terminally irritated, and at one point I just packed up and left.”

Asked why she thought their marriage had lasted, Woodward said: “I have no idea. Absolutely not one single idea on the subject. Probably sheer luck.”

And what about the time Newman packed up and left?

“I was gone about 15 minutes,” Newman said. “And I stopped and thought to myself, ‘What the hell am I doing? I have no place to go!’ And I turned around and came right back. Joanne’s right. She said it. What we’ve got is sheer luck!”