Real reason behind Madonna and Sean Penn’s divorce revealed

Despite their turbulent marriage, the director of the music video that brought Madonna and Sean Penn together claims that the Queen of Pop was “genuinely in love” with the actor.

The new Sky documentary features the speaker on archive audio. Sharon Oreck, the producer of the legendary Material Girl music video, says, “She was genuinely in love with him, but it felt as if the attraction between the two of them was fueled by the public. He was the budding movie star, she was the budding rock star and the public demanded that they come together.”

“It was like a bomb went off,” Oreck, 69, adds of when the pair started dating. “America’s bad boy and America’s bad girl.”

Penn, now 64, and Madonna, now 66, met on the music video set and started dating in February 1985.

Six months after they first met, they were married in Malibu, California, on Madonna’s 27th birthday, the day before Penn’s 25th birthday.

Their special day attracted a lot of attention. Madonna acknowledges in a documentary audio clip that she “couldn’t hear the vows” during the ceremony due to the helicopters buzzing overhead.

“There were 10 helicopters hovering above everything, so you couldn’t hear anything. It got Sean riled up,” adds her brother Christopher Ciccone, who is also featured in Becoming Madonna.

In the documentary, filmmaker Susan Seidelman, who directed Madonna in the 1985 movie Desperately Seeking Susan, claims that Sean Penn was quite irate and that he probably scribbled something like, “F— you,” in the sand for the helicopters to read.

“I don’t think she wanted the wedding to be like that,” Christopher adds. “She was trying to stop Sean from doing stupid s—. Looking back, all the craziness that went on [at the wedding], I think it may have been a bad omen for the future.”

Just over two years later, in December 1987, Madonna filed for divorce. “There was no one direct incident leading up to this,” her rep told People magazine at the time.

“It was a series of cumulative pressures. There were many moments in their marriage when it was shaky, and Madonna was finally forced to face the reality of the situation — that they weren’t happy together.”