It seems Michael Jackson may not have been quite as fond of Madonna as you might expect from her moving tribute at last week's VMAs.

The pair became friends in the early nineties, and went on several high profile dates, including showing up to the 1990 Academy Awards ceremony on each other's arm.

But in a nine-year-old filmed interview with his friend Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, due to be shown on TV this week, Michael claims the affection was purely one-sided.

He told Boteach: "I think she (Madonna) likes shock value and she knows how to push buttons on people. I think she was sincerely in love with me and I was not in love with her. She did a lot of crazy things. I knew we had nothing in common.

"She is not sexy at all. I think sexy comes form the heart in the way you present yourself."

The Thriller star believed Madonna was one of several stars who envied his fame, telling Boteach: "They admire you and know you are wonderful and great because they are jealous, because they wish they were in your shoes. Madonna is one of them. She is jealous. She is a girl, a woman and I think that's what bothers her...

"I get the fainting and adulation and she doesn't."

By constrast, Michael describes the late Princess Diana as his ideal woman: "I thought she was very special - very feminine and classy. She was my type for sure, and I don't like most girls. There are very few I like who fit the mould. It takes a very special mould to make me happy and she was one of them."

Boteach - who is allowing US shows Today and Dateline to broadcast segments of the interview this week - maintains Michael wanted the footage to be released to the public so his fans could gain a better understanding of his personal life.

Strange, then, that he should wait nine years until after the singer's untimely death...

Remembering Michael Jackson