Jack White staged a “Love Interruption” at a recent concert by proposing to and wedding now-wife Olivia Jean onstage — but he says the nuptials weren’t completely out of the blue.
During the Wednesday night episode of The Late Show, the 46-year-old Third Man Records founder opened up to host Stephen Colbert about what led to his decision to present Jean with an engagement ring during a duet of the White Stripes’ “Hotel Yorba” and bring Third Man co-founder Ben Swank onstage to officiate their wedding moments later.
White informed the comedian he was thinking about proposing all day but wasn’t entirely sure about making the move until shortly before the April 8 concert at Detroit’s Masonic Temple began. “I thought, as the day was going on, if a day had some left turns, maybe it wasn’t the right day,” he said during the interview. “But the day kept going so well! I figured it was a good time.”
Ultimately, he said the 32-year-old Black Belles frontwoman made the decision to tie the knot onstage in front of White’s audience. “I asked her, ‘Do you get married now, or do you wanna wait?'” recalled the rock star. “And she’s like, ‘No! Right now! This is a great day!'”
RELATED: Jack White Gets Engaged, Married to Olivia Jean Onstage at Hometown Detroit Concert
Prior to the concert, White performed “The Star-Spangled Banner” ahead of a Detroit Tigers game, a moment he told Colbert may have contributed to his decision to propose to Jean. “They won the game. That was another good sign, right?” he said.
Despite their brief exchange about the onstage nuptials, White said Jean was initially taken aback by the proposal. “She was very surprised… Luckily, Ben Swank — who works at Third Man Records — he’s also a minister of some church on the internet. I don’t know,” he detailed with a laugh. “He was backstage.”
Following the surprise ceremony last week, White posted a photo of the onstage proposal to Instagram. “‘Let’s get married in a big cathedral by a priest.’ 04.08.22,” read the post’s caption, a reference to the “Hotel Yorba” lyrics.
From 1996 to 2000, White was first married to the other half of the White Stripes, Meg White, 47, whose last name he adopted and uses professionally to this day. In 2005, he then got married to Karen Elson, 43, and together they had two kids: 15-year-old daughter Scarlett Teresa and 14-year-old son Henry Lee.
