Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.

Underground > Conversation >

Best Man's Speech

Page: 1(2)3

The resistable rise of Reidcourchie

12:22 / 27.07.06

Depends on the bride. I couldn't have coped had I been Freddie Prinz's best man. Well except for having to put up with Freddie Prinz.

14:16 / 27.07.06

I had mulled over the idea of doing something with that (manipulating the context, changing the words in the bubbles, that kind of thing), but they would have to be blown up pretty big to be visible in enough detail.

You could pass it around. I was best man once for a friend who had done pretty much nothing that could be whipped up into any semblance of ribaldry. His stag night (organised by someone other than myself, I hasten to add) was basically him having a couple of cinzanos then wanting to drink water because, as ever, he didn't see the point of alcohol or anything else that "stops you being in control". Someone unoriginal had hired a strippogram nonetheless, and she went through the motions. There were various photos from the night where it looked vaguely oo-er missus wackilarious, and I arranged the most pseudo-compromising into an attractive montage and got it framed. I then based around half the speech around that (one part faux-laddisme to one part sincerity) before handing it to the groom's parents, from whence it was handed around the room to much ooh-it's-the-always-the-quiet-ones amusement. So that one worked out okay, and the groom actually derived some cachet from what looked a far wilder stag night than was in fact the case.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

14:28 / 27.07.06

let's face it, who ever complains about a speech being too short?

I did once. We were taking bets on it, and I had a tenner on it lasting 20 minutes. He petered out after about quarter of an hour.

*

14:48 / 27.07.06

There's something a bit discomfiting about all the "ooer, you'd have to marry her!" and "scary alpha female"ing in this thread. I mean, I think hetero wedding traditions tend to be pretty sexist as they are, but I wish I wouldn't see it reinforced here.

14:57 / 27.07.06

I'm not sure that stuff's necessarily being reinforced here - not intentionally so, anyway - but anyone being pulled into being a best man (and it's a tricky thing to turn down) finds himself wrestling with all manner of fairly hideous hetero tradition. Much of it made me somewhat uncomfortable but in the end I decided to go with it as much as I could.

Marrying the bridesmaid would've been fairly disastrous for me.

Happy Dave Has Left

14:59 / 27.07.06

Smoothly, I've done the best man thing twice in the last three years - I can send you copies of my speeches (names removed) if you want some pointers (n.b., they were very well received, so they should be a good starting point)

15:01 / 27.07.06

That's very organised, Happy Dave. I've got a best man and a father of the bride speech kicking around somewhere, but I suspect they'd both be somewhat specific for Smoothly's purposes. Good source of jokes, though, I expect.

15:08 / 27.07.06

Really, if anyone has any tried and tested speeches they'd be willing to let me read (just for feel and inspiration) I'd be very grateful. Please do PM me (I can give you an email address if that's easier).

*

15:11 / 27.07.06

Hey, any current, former, or near-future brides/bridesmaids/mothers-of-brides want to chime in about what they like in best-man speeches? That could be a help as well.

15:14 / 27.07.06

Yes, yes, yes! And grooms for that matter.

15:14 / 27.07.06

Or, indeed, wedding-goers in general.

16:00 / 27.07.06

Also, since it’s come up a few times now, I wouldn’t mind a minor tangent to address another area of anxiety this all hold for me.

I have problems with the whole marriage thing, for reasons familiar to lots of people here and discussed in depth elsewhere. Suffice it to say, I have been with my (female) partner for many years, but have no intention of marrying her.
Now, this has caused a certain amount of social awkwardness at pretty much every wedding we have attended together. The nature of the occasion – lots of people, many of them strangers to one another – thrown together in a cosy environment where small-talk reigns supreme. So, if you’re in a (m/f) couple, several people are bound to ask you (a) if you’re married, and if not (b) if you have plans to.

I haven’t worked out a good answer to this second question that doesn’t either knock the institution you are actively talking part in, or suggest a lack of commitment. I’ve kind of settled on responding to (a) with “No, we don’t really feel the need”, thus cutting them off at the pass, but even that sounds a bit sneery.
This time round, when I’m essentially a cheerleader for the event, I feel I need a better answer, or a better way of dodging the question.
Any suggestions?

16:10 / 27.07.06

Listen, get a bit drunk. Not shity pissing on the bride drunk, but loose lipped drunk.

The worst thing you can do is try to be funny. If you cant think of anything funny, DONT TRY!

Just stand up, hit the glass and welcome everyone to the wedding, tell everyone what a great guy the groom is, what a good person he is. Give one example of his chivalry, tell them that the groom has confided in you (his best friend) how much he loves his new bride. and wish them luck. Then your done. That easy, less than a minute.

My best man (my brother) went on four almost five minutes in an attempt to be funny. It was so fucking terrible that I finally stood up and thanked him and anounced that we would be cutting the cake.

Good luck.

16:12 / 27.07.06

and dont worry. stop thinking about this, because you are going to stress yourself to fucking death!

01:03 / 28.07.06

Cheers, Ender. That's not as unhelpful as it might seem. I spent some of the stag do lowering other people's expectations; it's probably not a bad idea to lower my own.

The resistable rise of Reidcourchie

07:00 / 28.07.06

Id I was talking about my own experiences, that's all, should I censor them for you? If so I'll need your criteria for what I can and can't post.

08:22 / 28.07.06

yeah weird response from id i thought - 'alpha females' do exist right? it's not the 'female' that makes them 'scary', but the 'alpha' - i.e the being comfortable with wielding power over folk who don't like being bossed around to someone else's standards?

ditto the 'you'd have to marry her' bit - the poster who mentioned that described that as being 'scary' - surely it's the thought that this is an old (perhaps entirely apocryphal) function of the best man role, indicating a nasty time when the potential wife would have been so much chattel, that makes this scary too? or maybe that by accepting the best man role you're relinquishing the right to find a partner for yourself, because you've committed to pairing up with your friend's betrothed? (fuck knows where your 'friend' is supposed to be while you and her are being forced to spend the rest of your naturals together. dead by a plough at the least, i'd hope.)

or is the sweat on my back making me a bit daily mail? very difficult to think.

08:27 / 28.07.06

oop, sorry, just seen the policy thread - will have a read and reconsider my everything.

The resistable rise of Reidcourchie

07:28 / 31.07.06

Smoothly has the wedding been and gone? How'd it go?

07:52 / 31.07.06

It's this weekend coming, Reidcourchie. Still plenty of time to get hit by a bus.

08:59 / 31.07.06

Just stay away from the Brown Acid.

The resistable rise of Reidcourchie

09:11 / 31.07.06

Strangely enough at the wedding I was best manning at the groom was so nervous we discussed whther or not dropping acid before the ceremony was a good idea. He eventually decided against it as he felt he would have just ended up prodding the vicars face as he was trying to conduct the ceremony and the Bride's mum, who had terrorised both the bride and the groom in the run up to the wedding, would probably have taken on a Godzillaesque identity and proceeded to rampage through the Cotswalds of his minds eye.

Brigade du jour

09:29 / 31.07.06

I did a best man speech once. It wasn't a total disaster but it felt like the deflation of the proverbial lead balloon, so you may wish to treat my advice with caution - Smoothly, if it's troubling you that much just keep it very, very brief. I know next to nothing of the particular circumstances of this wedding, obviously, but still ... the briefer you keep it, the sooner it'll be over.

I'll be over here watching the video of my speech for the 473rd time crying over what I might have done differently if anybody wants me ...

13:28 / 31.07.06

Blimey, just be glad you only have to perform a short best man's speech. Imagine if you had to do that for starters, but then also had to step-up and perform a semi-improvised magical ritual to effectively "marry" the couple, in front of 200+ of their confused and not entirely convinced family members. The best man's speech was the easy bit!

The resistable rise of Reidcourchie

13:33 / 31.07.06

Yep, ritual magic can confuse weddings, except for (insert dominant mainstream religion of your choice) ritual magic.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

13:56 / 31.07.06

Yeah, but you pulled that off with flying colours, Gypsy. I wish someone'd have a video camera- then you could have shown Smoothly exactly how to go about it.

14:23 / 31.07.06

We’re obviously very different, you and I, GL. I don’t know much about magic, but I’d rather wank over a sigil while shitting a witch bottle than stand up and address a room full of strangers.

14:28 / 31.07.06

But would you want to address a room full of strangers, and then have to stand up and wank over a sigil and shit in a witch bottle in front of your audience after you finished your speech? Not that the wedding ceremony involved such acts, but you get the idea.

14:32 / 31.07.06

Oh that's what I meant. (And yeah, forgive me ignorance about what such a ritual might involve - I was mostly going by what Stoatie said.)

14:44 / 31.07.06

Oh, and Konchesky – can you bring yourself to give us an idea of why your speech went down so badly? Avoiding going *wrong* would actually count as a win for me.

Brigade du jour

13:29 / 02.08.06

I think the problem was simply that I was trying to do a speech that would be funny, but I didn't really know any of the extended families of the bride and groom, so I didn't know how to pitch it - probably not too rude, don't want to upset the grannies etc. Not too saccharine either, because it would have just felt so fake the words would probably have literally stuck in my throat and then made me burp or something.

Plus I'm just not very good at public speaking. This was all 11 years ago now and I'm still not good at addressing a group larger than about three people (and I have to know all three people pretty well, first).

Sorry, I know that's probably not very helpful!

14:07 / 02.08.06

That’s my problem precisely, Konchesky.
I bashed out a draft the other night and I kinda thought it was going quite well. One story reminded me of another, neat segues suggested themselves, there was a bit of witty word-play. But then I made the mistake of reading it out – as if I were delivering the speech – to time it. And ye gods, it sucked. *I* sucked. I got stage fright in an empty room. I’m just way too self-conscious and some things that work okay on paper just don’t work when delivered out-loud to a mixed audience. I could just picture the blank faces and embarrassed shuffling.

It’s going to be a disaster. It’s actually rather nice to know that I won’t be the first person to bomb doing a best man’s speech.

16:04 / 02.08.06

It might be an idea to try reading it out to someone else SW, or at least letting them have a look at it - it probably isn't as bad you think.

16:11 / 02.08.06

That's an option, 1, certainly. My colleagues are begging me to let them read it. And there is a sizable bounty on a video of me delivering it. But I'd feel even more stupid and self-conscious acting out the speech than I will doing it for real, I think. Unnaturalness piled on unnaturalness, if you see what I mean.

I'll probably let my sugared almond read it the night before, but it's the actual delivery I'm most anxious about now.

Somebody kill me. Please.

18:13 / 02.08.06

Okay

Page: 1(2)3