Today family friend Oliver Cromwell has married Tess of the D’Urbervilles. Hurrah!

The best man needed some support with the speech, so I helped out.

Best Man (BM) speeches are among the most important any male may have to give in life. They are even more occasion-specific than other speeches. Some weddings involve scores of guests and the real problem of addressing a large group in a large room. Others are very small, so the words need a quite different style – much more intimate.

Plus the BM is likely to know many of the people at the wedding well, perhaps very well, but others scarcely at all.

One way or the other, pitching the speech at the right tone which is amusing, touching but perhaps above all inclusive/welcoming is not easy, the more so since there are so few opportunities in life to practise this special genre.

What happens? Experience shows that it is all too easy to drift into a series of ill-assorted (and often crudely ribald) badly delivered and structure-free anecdotes mainly about the groom, which have some resonance for a small number of the guests but embarrass or baffle many others.

Anyway, on this occasion the BM was unsure how to proceed and quite unpractised in public speaking. So we eventually hit upon the idea of turning these uncertainties into an advantage, by replacing much of the speech with a PowerPoint presentation featuring all sorts of funny family photos supported by his choice of words and music.

Which sounds fine. The problem as always is doing it well. If you want to move away from a straightforward speech, you need to make sure that any supporting special effects which sound fine as the ideas go to and fro are going to work on the day.

This has to involve a recce of the room concerned and checking/confirming 200% how any IT or sound equipment is going to set up and operated smoothly. And how all the guests are going to be able to watch the production. Nothing worse than pressing the button after the lights go down and … nothing happens, or various people can’t see/hear it and feel left out..

The point?

It doesn’t matter what you do as a Best Man, or how you do it with or without special effects. Keep it simple, warm-hearted and gracious and you won’t go far wrong.

I nonetheless await the reports from today’s fixture with no little interest…

And if anyone wants to hire me to help with a Best Man (or even a funeral) speech, click here.