Instead of feeling her feelings, workaholic control freak Madonna has found an even better way to deal with the emotional issues resulting from her divorce: more work! And why feel sad when you can feel the music in you?

In her first interview since her divorce, Madonna admits her split from Guy Ritchie has been tough.

“I’m sad about my personal life, but I feel very blessed and very lucky that I have the opportunity to do what I do in my professional life,” she told The Associated Press on Sunday.

As she continues on her Sticky & Sweet tour, she said her heavy workload “provides a distraction that keeps me going.”

She added, “It would be horrible if I was just thinking about getting a divorce and had nothing to do.”

Ritchie is also staying busy, as he films Sherlock Holmes in London.

[From Us Weekly]

How in the world do other people manage to get divorced without having a grueling concert schedule to focus on? Sure, most of us work, but the day ends at some point and we’re left with our thoughts. Madonna just keeps on dancing. And going to the Kabbalah Centre. A winning combination that’s recommended by marriage and family therapists as the best way to get through any divorce.

At some point Madge is going to have to stop distracting herself and deal with whatever negative emotions she’s avoiding. Sooner is probably better than later, as that’ll be less time she’s pushing down her rage at Guy for not going to the gym three hours a day and not letting her wear the jewel-encrusted football player shoulder pads when they had sex. That one time. The sooner Madge screams and yells and rages, the better. Though hopefully she’ll give everyone some warning so all living creatures can get the hell out of her way first.

Here’s Madonna at the Kabbalah Center with her children Lourdes and David on November 21, 2008 Images thanks to Bauer-Griffin.

Madonna and Guy’s nearly eight year marriage was legally severed today at a hearing at the High Court in London. Neither Madonna nor Guy were present and the proceedings lasted just a few minutes. The two agreed on a settlement that makes Guy out to be the more responsible party. Guy will retain joint custody of his two boys and is receiving the cash equivalent of their London townhouse, about $37 million USD. He will also get to keep his London pub and their country home, but the settlement he agreed on is not even close to half the money Madonna earned during their marriage. According to The Sun, which has had insider stories throughout the divorce and is thought to have a source in the Madonna camp, Madonna is mad that the papers are making it seem like Guy is not asking for a dime.

The divorce sped through after the couple struck a deal on property, money and access to their kids. Last night Guy, 40, said: “It dragged on much too long and that had nothing to do with me. But it was never ever about money.”

As The Sun reported last month, Guy will keep the Punchbowl pub in London’s Mayfair and his beloved Wiltshire estate.

He will also get a cash payment equivalent to the value of their Marylebone townhouse — around £25million.

Film director Guy is worth £30million in his own right and could have claimed as much as half of Madonna’s £300million fortune.

He is accepting far less — but reports he was refusing to accept even a penny infuriated the Queen of Pop, 50.

A source said: “Madonna is livid that people think he hasn’t asked for a penny when he is walking away with millions.” Their case — Ciccone M L v Ritchie G S — was listed before District Judge Reid today.

Their decree nisi was announced at 10am in Court 10 of the Principal Registry of the High Court’s Family Division in High Holborn, central London.

A pal said: “It was threatening to become the messiest bunfight in years.”

The source said Rocco, eight, and adopted son David Banda, three, will split their time between America and Britain while 12-year-old Lourdes — Madonna’s daughter from an earlier relationship — will live with her mum full-time.

[From The Sun]

Leave it to Madonna to get mad at her now ex husband’s perfectly reasonable demands. At least their kids will be able to move on and not have to hear the details of their parents’ messy divorce. We could have been treated to a lot of potentially embarrassing information and allegations from both sides. Madonna and Guy’s two sons, Rocco, 8, and David, 3, are now with their dad in Liverpool, where he’s filming Sherlock Holmes.

Update: According to People, they were granted a “preliminary divorce” will will become official in 6 weeks if neither side disputes the ruling. Madonna issued a statement to the court that she was divorcing Guy for his “unreasonable behavior.” That’s rich coming from her.

Madonna and Guy Ritchie may finalize their divorce tomorrow, according to the Sun. Maybe I’m jaded but I actually consider this to be pretty quick for a divorce proceeding, especially considering the amount of money involved. However the Sun insists that money wasn’t the big holdup – the main sticking point was over the custody of Madge and Guy’s sons Rocco and David. They’ve agreed to split custody, and the boys will bounce back and forth between New York and London.

MADONNA and GUY RITCHIE will divorce tomorrow, according to papers lodged with the High Court.

It is expected she will keep the bulk of her £300million fortune, despite the British director being entitled to up to half of it.

The stumbling block for the couple up to now was custody of their two boys – eight-year-old Rocco and adopted three-year-old son David.

However a newspaper reports that they have agreed to share guardianship. The lads will split their time between the UK and US, where Madonna now lives.

She will have sole custody of her daughter Lourdes, from a previous relationship. It is believed that full details of any financial settlement will be kept confidential. A source said: “The priority for Guy has always been the children – he has not wanted her money.”

[From the Sun]

I wonder how they’re going to actually split custody. If it’s literally a 50/50 situation that would require the boys to leave school partway through the term each year, and that could be severely disruptive. It sounds like Madonna and Guy have agreed on a deal that’s fair to them, but not necessarily fair to their sons. Hopefully they’ll figure out a way to keep some continuity in the boys’ educations.

The Daily Mail claims that Ritchie refused to “take a penny of the pop star’s cash.” If that’s accurate – and it’s the Daily Mail, so grain of salt and all that – it really speaks a lot to his character and his motivations. Madonna’s people have tried to paint Guy as a money hungry bore who was waited on hand and foot by staff and blew through Madge’s cash. None of their allegations were really believable, and this shows Guy wasn’t with Madonna for the money. Now if someone could explain to me why he was with her, that’d be great.

Header of Madonna at the Gucci/Unicef event last night. Clearly she’s trying to get attention. Or doing a terrible, terrible job of blending in with camouflage.

Madonna in Vancouver on her “Sticky and Sweet” world tour, Oct. 31, 2008. Photo credit: Bauergriffin.

Madonna is reportedly becoming more and more infatuated by Yankees’ third baseman Alex Rodriguez. A-Rod, who allegedly told his personal trainer that Madonna was his “f-in soul mate, dude,” has been spotted at several of her concert venues, including her gig at Dodgers’ Stadium in Los Angeles, and the pair is supposedly planning a trip to Malawi together after her tour ends. Madge has been gushing to friends about A-Rod – but she’s also still taunting her soon-to-be ex-husband Guy Ritchie with obnoxious text messages. Because Madonna can’t sleep at night unless EVERYONE is paying attention to her- even her cast-offs.

MADONNA and Alex Rodriguez are turning to mush over each other. Sources close to Madge tell the Chicago Sun-Times she’s so smitten with her rumored Yankee lover, she informed a close pal he “has the heart of a poet trapped inside an insanely gorgeous body.” Rodriguez, meanwhile, has been writing “sweet, personal and rambling expressions of his feelings,” the paper reports. “Sort of like old-fashioned love notes.”

[From Page Six]

Somehow, I can’t see A-Rod writing poetry. Rambling expressions, maybe – possibly in crayon.

You’d think that with a hunky new guy to fawn over, that would be enough for Madonna, but of course, she still has to threaten and annoy Guy Ritchie. Apparently, she’s convinced that all of these leaks to the media are coming from him.

Madonna has been taunting Guy Ritchie with dozens of weird text messages.
Director Guy, 40, showed crew on the set of his latest film Sherlock Holmes one which read: “You’re going down.”

He said he found his estranged wife’s behaviour odd, but that he is used to it by now. And he confided in one pal: “This is her idea of a joke – but it’s not funny. Imagine what it was like living with her.”

Guy, filming in Manchester, has yet to talk to Madonna, 50, since their split was announced two weeks ago.

But she is said to be fuming details of their marriage have been leaked – and blames him.

A source said: “She loves to wind Guy up and this is just another example of her oddball humour. He doesn’t take these things too seriously. If he did, it would drive him mad.”

[From Mirror.co.uk via GossipRocks]

If Madonna really is as taken with A-Rod as reported, it won’t be long until we see them together. That’s gonna be weird. They are such an unlikely couple- I had a hard time accepting it. But A-Rod does like the muscular blonds, and Madge has a well documented thing for Latin guys, so I guess it makes sense they’d be lusting after one another. But the “heart of a poet”? Please.

Photos of A-Rod the poet having lunch with Madonna’s non-Gwyneth BFF, Ingrid Casares, last month in New York City. Maybe she was spell-checking his love notes. Photo credit: Bauergriffin.

Madonna and Guy in a file image. Credit: Fame
According to Madonna’s brother and biographer, Christopher Ciccone, Madonna is trying to hit her estranged husband Guy Ritchie where it hurts – in his already atrophied professional life. Madonna recently released her directorial debut, the near universally panned Filth and Wisdom, and Ciccone thinks that she’ll continue directing. It sounds like speculation from Madonna’s brother, but he could be right:

“Apparently she wants to be directing and that’s what she’ll be doing. Two directors in the family is never going to work,” Christopher Ciccone said.
Pop queen Madonna, 50, made her directing debut with Filth And Wisdom this year, a comedy about a Ukrainian gypsy. She described the process as “essentially my way of putting myself through film school”.

Ritchie found fame with his debut feature Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, but his follow-up films met with little acclaim.

“He was generally a miserable guy and he got worse. He became less and less happy as a person, I think because his career isn’t where he wants it to be,” claimed Mr Ciccone.

“Her career continues up and it’s not going down, whereas his career had dropped off and he has made a series of not very good movies.”

[From Telegraph.co.uk]

Some of the reviews of Filth and Wisdom include “tedious, pretentious, and just plain boring,” “a vanity project in the smallest sense possible,” and “thoroughly inept in just about every aspect.” Guy Ritchie’s reviews aren’t much better, particularly since he married Madonna and his career suffered from that Swept Away albatross he made with her, but at least he had some successful films in the past and is an arguably competent director.

I hope Madonna’s brother is wrong and she goes back to jumping around on stage and acting younger than she is. Maybe her egotism knows no bounds, though, and she’ll make more terrible movies that no one goes to see. It might keep her busy for a while and at least she’ll be behind the camera and not in front of it.

Meanwhile there’s a rumor that Madonna may be the next face of Louis Vuitton. The luxury goods giant must have realized that their best customers in these troubled economic times are rich old ladies.

As we reported yesterday, Guy Ritchie was joyfully reunited with his sons after not seeing them for weeks following the breakup of his marriage to their mother, Madonna. You can see how happy both Guy and Rocco are to see each other in the photos at the Daily Mail. But according to that same publication, the boys were accompanied by a long list of rules to be followed while they were with their dad.

According to a text photo at Daily Mail.com, the following rules were set by Madonna for visitation:

1. Under no circumstances should they be allowed to read newspapers, magazines, or watch TV or DVDs

2. They must adhere at all times to a macrobiotic, vegetarian, organic diet with no processed or refined food

3. All water they drink, even when it is to dilute organic juice, should be Kabbalah water

4. They should wear only the clothes Madonna has sent with them, if they need to be bought anything new, it should not contain any man-made materials

5. The boys’ hands should be regularly cleaned with disinfectant spray if they are in public places

6. They should not be bought toys that are spiritually or ethically unsound

7. The divorce should not be discussed with them

8. Madonna should have contact by phone with them when and how often she chooses, as often as three or four times a day at times she sets

9. Guy should not introduce the boys to any of his new friends, especially any new female friends

10. Madonna wants the boys to spend their time she’s given with Guy, and not large amounts of time with his parents, their grandparents

11. The boys should not be photographed when they are with Guy and it’s his responsibility to arrange security so it doesn’t happen

12. At bedtime, Guy should read Madonna’s English Rose books to David

I’m sending transcendental encouragement to Guy Ritchie for a long movie night, with delivery pizza, soda pop, friends and grandparents and the phones shut off. And a permanent ban on the English Rose series from the home.

The more I read this list of rules I imagine safety-pinned to Rocco’s shirt, the more incredulous I become. Would Madonna really expect more of Guy than she does herself? And does she really believe she still has control over the time the boys spend with their father? Then I think about those questions and I realize that yes, she probably would and probably does. It’s a long standing tradition that parents who are no longer together have a power struggle when it comes to how the kids will be raised when they are in the custody of the other. Watch any divorce based movie. I just watched The Squid and the Whale, a perfect example, and a depressing movie. The kids suffer way more than the parents when a battle for the parental upperhand occurs.

Guy Ritchie is shown outside his Punchbowl Pub on 11/7/08. Madonna and Rocco are shown outside the Kabbalah Centre in LA on 11/8/08. Credit: WENN

A few weeks ago, we told you that newly separated Guy Ritchie was having a fling with a pretty actress named Kelly Reilly. We got that information from Us Weekly, but it turns out that the magazine had it wrong. Reilly is actually engaged to someone else, and the mag printed a retraction on the story.

In our November 3 issue, we suggested that the actress Kelly Reilly was having a relationship with Guy Ritchie.

It is now clear from the further information that we have received that Ms. Reilly is engaged and there is and has been no romantic relationship between Kelly Reilly and Guy Ritchie. We apologize for any embarrassment caused to Ms. Reilly in our original report.

[From Us Weekly]

No word on which party demanded the retraction – but judging from the language used, I’d guess is was Kelly Reilly. Meanwhile, Guy does seem to be enjoying the single life, even if it’s somewhat of a sausage party. He’s been palling around with Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law, hanging at his pub, and more recently, spending time with his sons Rocco and David. It’s probably best for him that he doesn’t go running to another woman right now anyway – it would only make Madonna’s PR campaign look more credible.

Madonna is said to be planning a trip to Malawai to ensure that her Kabbalah-themed orphanage is proceeded as planned, and she’s said to be considering taking her rumored lover and recent convert to the cult, Alex Rodriguez, along.

You heard Alex Rodriguez was in the audience at Madonna’s L.A. show Thursday. Now we hear he’s thinking about following the divorcing Mrs. Ritchie to South America next month when she tours Brazil, Chile and Argentina. “Maybe she’ll teach Alex some songs from ‘Evita,’” quipped a friend. Madge is also said to have invited A-Rod to join her on her next trip to Malawi, where she’s building a kabbalah-enlightened school. Another source says Alex’s reported $500,000 donation to her Raising Malawi is greatly exaggerated. A charity spokesman declined to comment; A-Rod’s rep didn’t return calls.

[From The NY Daily News]

I wonder how long it will be before we see these two out together on a bona fide date. So far all we have are eyewitness sightings and no photos. It is thought that Madonna might try to keep the relationship from the press for the sake of her children, but how long do you think publicity-starved Madge will be able to resist flaunting her hot new starry-eyed boy toy? She couldn’t convince her husband to buy into Kabbalah so she ended up with a more devoted new follower who probably laps up her every word of store bought wisdom. She traded in for a more pliant partner.

Meanwhile Madonna’s estranged husband, Guy Ritchie, was seen reuniting with his sons Rocco, 8, and David Banda, 3, at the airport in London. The Daily Mail has the photos and you can see the joy on Ritchie’s face. It’s got to be hard for Guy to be so far from his children and I wonder if the British courts will rule that the kids should stay in their native England instead of having to fly 8 hours for scheduled visits with their dad.

Madonna is shown coughing outside the Kabbalah headquarters on Robertson Boulevard in LA on Saturday. Credit: Mike/Fame Pictures. Guy Ritchie is shown having a coffee on Sunday in London. His coffee date is credited as Rachel McAdams, who stars in the film he’s directing, Sherlock Holmes, but it doesn’t really look like her. (Thanks Lois). Credit: JACK
LUDLAM/bauergriffinonline

I get the impression that Guy Ritchie’s extended family, and in particular his father, are not big Madonna fans. Not surprising really, considering a significant portion of Madge’s own family don’t like her. Guy Ritchie’s father John is again yapping to the press about how much his son is enjoying being separated.

“He’s been in a very good mood,” his dad, John, exclusively tells In Touch. “I wasn’t upset that they split. I am very pleased for Guy that it is over.”

“Guy is finally starting to socialize in a way that we haven’t seen from him in years,” explains another source, adding that Guy’s desire to see his friends was a big reason behind his divorce. “Madonna had heard that Guy attended a bachelor party, and she became really upset,” says the source. A heated phone argument between the couple prompted Guy to demand an immediate legal separation. “He said, ‘I need to get this divorce going so I can live again.’” Now the only trouble on the horizon is hammering out custody of Rocco, 8, and David, 3. Guy doesn’t want his kids to “live in America permanently,” his father tells In Touch. “He is such a good, positive father, he won’t let that happen.”

In Touch Magazine

Madonna is supposedly dating Yankee Alex Rodriguez, which seems like a rebound fling. I think she hates the idea that Guy could be going straight back to his pleasant London life without her, and begin dating someone younger. Madonna might be rich, famous and talented, but judging by her dress sense, the main thing she’d really like to be is young again.

I also highly doubt that the British courts, who are notoriously fair in a divorce (they gave Heather Mills £24.3 million, remember) will allow Madonna to take her children to America on any kind of permanent basis. Guy can probably prove he has a need to stay in England, but Madonna has proved over the last few years that her career can be managed from the UK without the need to move.

Guy Ritchie is shown out last night in London with Joel Silver, the producer on his film Sherlock Holmes. He is also shown out on 11/4/08. Credit: Bauergriffinonline

Guy Ritchie is shown outside his pub on 10/31/08. He is not wearing his wedding ring. Credit Bauer Griffin

When you divorce Madonna, it seems you not only have to fight off your ex-wife and her lawyers, but also her fans. A knife-wielding Madonna fan tried to attack Guy Ritchie on the set of his latest film about Sherlock Holmes.

A crazed Madonna fan stormed on to the set of Guy Ritchie’s new movie and threatened to kill him.

The film director, who is in the process of divorcing the singer, was just yards away when the teenager burst on to the set waving a 12-inch knife and yelling: “Where’s Guy? I’m going to kill him!”

And as security guards wrestled him to the ground, he screamed: “I’m Madonna’s biggest fan! I’m gonna kill Guy.”

The teenager, dressed entirely in black, managed to get on to the set in Manchester where Guy is filming a remake of Sherlock Holmes.

Mirror Newspaper

It wouldn’t have occurred to me that anyone could be so unhinged (or that big of a Madonna fan, but perhaps the two are linked) to want to attack her ex-husband. Surely you could see the good things he’s done for her, like making Swept Away.

Guy’s rep has made no statement about the attack, and given that it features in a tabloid the incident might not have occurred, but I really do believe that a fan(atic) could have done this. The part that doesn’t ring true for me is that the attacker was 16 – surely no 16-year-old on the planet lusts after Madonna nowadays? She looks like gristle wrapped in my mother’s old gym clothes.

Here’s Guy outside his pub, The Punch Bowl, on 10/30/08 and 11/1/08. Guy stayed at the pub until 2am on Sunday morning. He is said to have sung that night and to have ordered McDonalds. Madonna is shown performing in Vancouver, Canada on 10/31/08. Credit: Bauergriffinonline.