MARILYN MANSON's Estranged Wife Says 'Something Pretty Bad' Caused Split

World Entertainment News Network reports that Dita Von Teese walked out on estranged husband Marilyn Manson on Christmas Day (Dec. 25, 2006) after discovering a shocking secret he was keeping. The burlesque star insists she and Manson were blissfully happy until the break-up. She refuses to reveal what drove them apart, but hints Manson may have cheated. She tells Harper's Bazaar magazine, "We were completely monogamous. I think people thought we were free and open, but we really believed in commitment, tradition and our vows. But sometimes people change their ideas, I suppose." On what caused the split, she adds, "Let's say it must have been something pretty bad!"

Marilyn Manson told France's Le Parisien newspaper that his divorce from Dita Von Teese provided topical fodder for the group's new album, "Eat Me, Drink Me". "Our relationship ended at Halloween," he said. "I was completely destroyed psychologically. I'd rented a house and begun working on this disc, which sort of tells everything that happened to me during the past year."

He continued, "I was married to someone who wanted me to change, become more adult, more responsible. I began not to like myself, not like what I do. I lost my identity. Everything began collapsing around me. The record allowed me to put an end to that." He also claims, on his web site, to have been robbed by his associates, and forced to deal with his mother's mental illness. What helped him regain his focus was a friend handing a butcher knife to him and offering, with morbid mock seriousness, to allow him to stab her. "When someone was willing to drown with me, I really didn't want to drown anymore," he explained.

The 38-year-old Manson has found a new soulmate in Evan Rachel Wood. "I've found my double, my twin, with my new girlfriend," he said. "She's 19 and certainly that's very young, but that's not a problem for me. She likes the same things as me. She understands I like to get up when night falls and go to sleep at dawn."

Manson met Wood when casting for his upcoming horror film, "Phantasmagoria: The Visions of Lewis Carroll", which he directed. The movie will be released in October.