How to write a Best Man speech
Make sure your speech doesn’t turn you into the worst man there instead of the best.
Your close friend has got engaged, so you go out to celebrate. After a bout of playful banter centred around prison analogies and the fidelity of his bride-to-be, he drops the bombshell: he wants you to pull on the penguin suit and be his best man.
You’re honoured; you’re thrilled; you both hug manfully before scorching your palms on a round of flaming sambucas; then an icy niggle worms up from your belly and takes root in the soft jelly of your social anxiety. Because organising paintballing, pub crawls, and cut-price flights to Prague is one thing, but once the mayhem of the stag-do is all just a hazy memory, your main duty is still to come – the best man speech.
I have had the nerve-wracking honour of delivering such a speech four times — twice for friends, and once each for my remarried parents – and on every occasion my palms were so slick with sweat the champagne flute nearly slipped from my grip when it came to the toast. So let me share these simple tips to ensure that should you ever find yourself wrapped in a waistcoat mumbling into a microphone before three hundred guests, you will cruise through the ordeal with the confidence of a seasoned public speaker.
The template
There is a time-honoured protocol to the best man speech: insult the groom (but not too viciously); wax lyrical about the beauty of the bride (but not too creepily); deliver at least one humorous anecdote that even the priest or vicar can enjoy; and invite the crowd to raise their glasses to the happy couple before the cutting of the cake and the clearing of the dancefloor.
There are a host of templates online that can be adapted to suit most weddings, with any number of scripted speeches available where you simply change the names of the couple. Or you could use the Verboten Format, where you pretend to have contacted the groom’s friends and family to ascertain what stories not to recount. This allows you to list a catalogue of embarrassing incidents that all end in the pay-off, “... so that’s a story I definitely won’t be telling you today!”
But if you want something more personal, it is just as easy to write a speech from scratch by keeping it short, safe, and sincere.
Keep it short
The key to a good speech is brevity. You may have been best friends with the groom since childhood, but you don’t need a minute of blather for every year shared.
Regardless of whether the speeches are set for before the meal or after — and personally, I find there is something sadistic about postprandial speeches: the speaker struggles to enjoy the meal due to performance nerves, while the audience are so stuffed full of food and drink, they would just rather have a pre-boogie snooze than be subjected to sixty minutes of self-congratulation from the top table — everyone will thank you for keeping things brief.
Keep it safe
There is obviously an onus on you to be entertaining, but don’t mistake the stage for a comedy club to showcase your stand-up routine complete with punchline drumbeats. No matter how much you guffawed into your pint when you heard it down the pub, avoid the temptation to share that joke about the guy with the speech impediment who went to the Bangkok brothel. Nothing spoils a wedding more than Great Auntie Gertrude having one of her turns.
A few well-timed witticisms guaranteed to tease out some harmless titters is the safer option, and less likely to offend than a stream of laddish episodes from the groom’s life that all end with “… and of course, by this time he was lying there in a puddle of his own sick with his trousers on his head”.
If your friend is passionate about his job or hobby, you could do a little research – or consult his work colleague or fellow club member – to construct an informed bit of humour.
I was once the best man for an electrical engineer, so I obtained a fancy-sounding blurb about operating systems from one of his colleagues. The set-up was my telling the audience how clueless I was about my friend’s convoluted area of expertise, before I rhymed off a spiel of technical jargon that drew approval from all the engineers in the crowd and laughter from everyone else. It was a simple idea but effective, not least because it showed I had gone that extra mile by making the effort to learn something that mattered to him.
Keep it sweet
While it is expected that you will generate laughs, some material to tug on the heartstrings will also win you the room. Remember, the groom did not invite you along to be a cabaret act — he asked you to be there on one of the most important days of his life as a friend he can depend on. Be that friend and speak from the heart about what it means to have been given this esteemed role. Sincerity will always be appreciated, not least when you consider that the happy couple’s families are present, so, if possible, a fond recollection of yours featuring the groom’s parents or siblings will go down a treat.
Keep it in the family
Of course, it may not be a friend who asks you to be the best man — it could be a parent. Your father or mother may be set to remarry, and you have been given the honour-slash-Freudian-nightmare (delete where appropriate) of performing best man duties. In this rarefied case, the standard template goes out the window.
The remarriage of a parent is more fraught with emotional baggage than most weddings, so you should find yourself performing to a very sympathetic crowd. One good memory from your childhood accompanied by warmest wishes is all you need to toast the happiness of a parent – although make sure said recollection doesn’t also feature the absent parent, or your speech could end up going the full Hamlet!
At the end of the day, regardless of your relationship to the groom, you are just a supporting character in the festivities that are unfolding and need not put yourself under undue stress. By taking the time to prepare a speech that is as emotional as it is entertaining, you are sure to end up the best man and not the worst.
If you have been asked to speak at a forthcoming wedding and would like help choosing the words, contact me today for a bespoke speech that will capture your personality and convey the truth of your relationship to the bride or groom in language you are comfortable with. Check out the full range of services here.