Gwyneth and Meg bid for same role

It's hardly the kind of light-hearted role film goers might associate with Meg Ryan.

Yet the life story of Sylvia Plath - the troubled writer who married poet Ted Hughes and later killed herself - is the unlikely backdrop to a battle between Ryan and Gwyneth Paltrow, and Gwyneth is currently in pole position.

Ryan, who made her name with nostalgic films such as Sleepless In Seattle and You've Got Mail, has a long-standing desire to play Plath. She once said of the writer that she "speaks to women forever".

But her hopes have been badly damaged with the news that Paltrow is to play the American-born Plath in a bio-pic about her life which begins filming later this year.

Sources say Ryan is desperately trying to win funding for her rival version of the story.

But the actress is reported to be having difficulty finding backers because, at 41, she is nearly 10 years older than Plath when she died. Paltrow, who is 29, may be considered more suitable for the part.

"She is scrambling to see if she can jump start her film and get it out before Paltrow," said an insider dealing with the project. "The movie-going public hasn't embraced Meg in darker roles. She's had some trouble getting backing for it. But don't underestimate her determination to make something happen."

Ryan's career is at something of a crossroads. Her last film, Kate And Leopold, recycled the single-girl-looking-for-Mr-Right storyline and made little impact on critics or the box office.

By comparison Paltrow has become one of Hollywood's most sought-after actresses after she won an Oscar in 1998 for her part in Shakespeare In Love. She is believed to command more than £2million a picture. She is currently going head to head with her friend Madonna - who is starring in Up For Grabs in the West End - by winning rave reviews for her appearance in Proof at the Donmar Warehouse.

Plath, who was a talented poet and well-known writer, married Hughes in 1956. Their relationship was tempestuous and dogged by allegations of infidelity on Hughes's part and increasingly erratic and unreasonable behaviour on hers.

The couple had two children, Frieda and Nicholas, but Hughes left Plath for his mistress, Assia Wevill, in 1962. In despair, Plath killed herself by putting her head in the gas oven at their flat in north London in February 1963. Her work and troubled life turned her into an icon for feminists and Hughes spent much of his life defending himself against accusations that he played a role in his wife's suicide. Before Hughes died five years ago he blocked several proposed Hollywood projects about his wife, including one that would have starred Pretty In Pink actress Molly Ringwald.

In 1998, Hughes - who was made Poet Laureate in 1984 - published Birthday Letters, a collection of poems which shed new light on his love for Plath.