There were cracks in the veneer

'There were cracks in the veneer': Madonna finally opens up on divorce to Guy Ritchie saying it left her wondering if true love existed

Madonna has revealed that her marriage to Guy Ritchie collapsed because the romance died, leaving her wondering if true love even existed.

The singer said that at the start things were ‘flawless' but as the years rolled on she began to notice ‘cracks in the veneer'.

She began to have doubts and realised that marriage ‘wasn't what I thought it was going to be'.

And come the end of their relationship all she could think about was the brutally blunt question: ‘How much am I willing to sacrifice?'

Madonna, 53, and Ritchie, 43, finally split up in 2008 after eight years of marriage.

They had a son together, Rocco, 11, and adopted another boy, David Banda, six.

In an interview with Newsweek magazine, Madonna said that she was nearing the end of her marriage when she started writing her new film W.E. about the love affair between Wallis Simpson and King Edward VIII, her first major project since the split.

At the time she said she was ‘certainly asking a kind of existential question that I think people ask when they've been married that long: what is the perfect love?'

She said: ‘Because when you start off, everything's great and lovely, and the person you've married is flawless, and you're flawless.

‘Then time goes by, and you share a life, you have children, and there are cracks in the veneer.

‘It's not as romantic as it used to be. You think, ‘This isn't what I thought it was going to be,' and ‘How much am I willing to sacrifice?''

Madonna's comments are a rare insight into her marriage, but Ritchie has been far more vocal about their relationship in the past.

He has said that whilst he does not regret his time with her, the drama was too much and that their life became a ‘soap opera'.

Friends of his have also claimed that her strict diet, her Kabbalah religion and obsession with yoga made it hard to live with her.

Madonna, who has four children in total, is currently dating dancer Brahim Zaibat, who at 24 is 29 years her junior.

She said in a recent interview that she is actually still a romantic and hoped one day to be 'swept away by a knight in shining armour'.

Ritchie is dating model Jacqui Ainsley and the couple had a baby son in September.

Meanwhile, on Tonight's Jay Leno show, Madonna spoke about one of her most iconic past performances.

The singer revealed how her infamous rendition of Like A Virgin at the 1984 Video Music Awards was not all planned – in fact flashing her underwear was an accident.

Madonna, who was looking demure in a sparkling shift dress which just below the knee and a pair of Christian Louboutin heels explained the incident.