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Metallica’s James Hetfield Gets Thumbs Up From Now-Fiancée in Underwater Proposal

"She said yes!" the frontman announced in an Instagram post

Metallica’s James Hetfield Gets Thumbs Up From Now-Fiancée in Underwater Proposal

James Hetfield and Kirk Hammett of Metallica perform live for SiriusXM on Aug. 28, 2025.

Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for SiriusXM
Larisha Paul
By Larisha PaulMar 16, 2026
Larisha Paul
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James Hetfield has a wedding to plan. The Metallica frontman took to Instagram to share news of his engagement to his now-fiancée, Adriana Gillett. Hetfield proposed during an underwater excursion by holding up a laminated note that read, “Will you marry me?”

Hetfield punctuated the question with a smiley face and got a thumbs up from Gillett in response. “She said yes!” the caption on the Instagram post read. Gillett shared the same image on her own account, plus a bonus shot of a whale shark. “The BEST birthday trip surprise,” she wrote. “Swimming with whale sharks on Friday the 13th with the most unique, special, and romantic proposal a Pisces could ever imagine. In a sea full of fish, we caught each other. Thank you God for putting us together.”

The musician’s union with Gillett will mark his second marriage. Hetfield filed for divorce from Francesca Hetfield, his wife of 25 years, in 2022. The former couple shares three children together, Cali, 27, Marcella, 24, and Castor, 25.

In between wedding planning, Hetfield will be getting ready for an extensive residency at the Sphere in Las Vegas. The Life Burns Faster run will span 24 nights from October 2026 through March 2027. “We are so appreciative and grateful to all of you for the incredible response to our upcoming Life Burns Faster residency at Sphere in Las Vegas,” Metallica wrote on Instagram. “We are completely and utterly blown away and cannot believe that we will have 24 amazing nights on stage there, all thanks to you and a record-breaking week.”

Drummer Lars Ulrich shared, “This residency gives us another chance to reinvent how we interact with our fans in a live setting. We are beyond excited to share this with the world in six months time, and way fuckin’ psyched to go next level!”

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