Golden couple call it quits
The golden couple of show business, Nicholas Tse Ting-fung and Cecilia Cheung Pak-chi, are to end their troubled five-year marriage.
After months of rumours, Cheung's management company Asia Entertainment Group issued a statement yesterday on behalf of the couple saying: 'We have decided to file for divorce because of our irreconcilable differences ... we have reached an agreement peacefully.'
The statement did not say if the 'agreement' was related to the distribution of their wealth.
The couple have two sons - Lucas, four, and Quintus, one - and the statement said: 'We will raise our two children together ... everything [we] do will be for the sake and happiness of our children.'
The relationship between Tse, who was crowned best actor at the Hong Kong Film Awards this year, and fellow award-winner Cheung has been one of the most discussed showbiz love tales. Tse, who will turn 31 at the end of this month, was dating Canto-pop diva Faye Wong when he became involved with Cheung, now 31, a decade ago.
In 2002, Tse was convicted of conspiring to pervert the course of justice after he crashed his Ferrari in Cotton Tree Drive, Central. Tse was reportedly driven away by Cheung in another car. He was sentenced to 240 hours of community service.
But things did not work out at the time and the pair did not reunite until 2005, during the filming of the movie The Promise. They married in secret in the Philippines the following year.
Lucas was born in 2007, but a few months later, explicit sex photos of Edison Chen Koon-hei and a string of female stars - including Cheung - rocked the public. Tse and Cheung survived the scandal, but rumours about their separation emerged in May when she was said to have taken a picture with Chen when she ran into him on a flight.
