How to MC a Wedding

I was recently honored to MC my good friend Tony's wedding down in So. Cal. I have to admit I was quite nervous about it, since I'd only MC'd one wedding before -- and that was seven years ago -- and because Tony MC'd our wedding and is an enormously talented entertainer. So MC'ing his wedding was sort of like singing for Rich Mullins.

At the end of the night, all was well -- there weren't any major mishaps, the guests were entertained, and, most importantly, the bride and groom seemed to have enjoyed themselves. When it came down to it, I only really had three obligations. These were:

1. Introduce the wedding party. This was the only thing I could really thoroughly prepare in advance. At my beautiful and talented wife's suggestion, I sent an email to all the bridesmaids and groomsmen asking (a) how they knew the bride/groom, (b) for a funny story about the bride/groom, and (c) for a message they'd like to share with the bride and groom. I told them that their emails would be used primarily to prepare their introductions, but might also be integrated into other parts of the reception. In order to get the responses quickly (since I foolishly waited until just a few days before the wedding to send out the emails), I told the wedding party members that their responses didn't have to perfect, since I'd probably only be able to use a small portion of their responses in any event.

I eventually got emails back from four of the six bridesmaids and one of the groomsmen. (I'm not sure what this says about female v. male responsiveness, but you can draw your own conclusions.) Fortunately, I was able to talk with the other groomsmen at the bachelor party and caught the two remaining bridesmaids before the reception. All of the responses were helpful, but a few of them were amazing -- practically essays. While I was only able to use a small portion of the content from these replies over the course of the evening, it did give me a lot of insight into the bride, whom I didn't know as well. And it reinforced my impression of how well-suited the bride and groom were for each other -- which made the job of being the MC even more fun and rewarding.

2. Keep the reception on schedule. The first key to keeping the reception on schedule was to know the schedule -- and each person listed in the schedule. I spent a couple of hours before the afternoon wedding ceremony pouring over the reception schedule and doing my best to become thoroughly acquainted with it. During the wedding ceremony, I focused on matching names from the schedule with actual faces -- a few of which I was seeing for the first time. (This came in handy later when I needed to find various members of the wedding party and the bride and groom's families.) Immediately after the ceremony, I went over to the reception hall and met with the reception coordinator, a member of the staff from the banquet facility, and the DJ, a friend of the bride's. This was my first look at the reception hall, and the three of us quickly decided where the mics should go and how the wedding party should enter the hall.

By the time the first quests had filled their plates with appetizers and were trickling into the hall itself (as opposed to mingling by the appetizer table outside the hall), we were largely ready to go -- and even on-time. Of course, that didn't last. It took longer than expected for guests to get through the appetizers line, take pics at the photo booth outside, and make it to their seats in the hall. So we were soon running 15 minutes late. And that was the second key to keeping a wedding reception on schedule -- be flexible with the schedule! We never did get exactly in line with the planned schedule, but we didn't overstay our welcome at the reception hall and nothing in the schedule got dropped.

The third key to keeping things on schedule was to stay alert. This meant keeping an eye on speakers to make sure they hadn't wandered off to the bathroom when their turn to speak came, tracking the servers to make sure that the schedule was roughly consistent with the pace at which guests were eating, and ensuring that each toaster had a glass of champagne nearby when the time came to lift his/her glass.

3. Fill in the gaps. Into even the sunniest weddings, a little rain must fall -- figuratively, if not literally. When that rain falls, it's the job of the MC to make sure that no one gets too wet. In Tony's wedding, the rain fell when the computer running the wedding slideshow crashed 10 minutes into the show. The guests had all moved from their tables to the front of the reception hall to get a better view of the screen. As we waited for the DJ and videographer to reboot the computer, I found myself face to face with the clustered guests and confronted with the task of filling the time until we could get back to the program. Looking back, I realize there were at least three ways of accomplishing that goal.

The first is through stories. If I had to redo the reception, I would spend more time going through the emails I got from the bridesmaids and groomsmen to glean two or three really good stories about the bride and/or groom to share with the guests.

The second way is through games. There are many wedding games that come in handy when you need to take up time at a reception; some games even make their way onto the schedule itself. I'm not a huge fan of "Chinese games" and other games that are designed to make fun of the bride and groom, since these have the potential to end disastrously and can be a bit crude. But I love games that recognize specific guests, and one of my favorites is the game that identifies the couple that's been married the longest and has them come up to give the secret to the longevity of their marriage to the bride and groom. That's the game that I relied on when we had our little crisis, and there was definitely something both dignified and sweet when the elderly couple shared their marriage advice with Tony and his bride.

The final way is through attitude. As Tony himself mentioned to me a couple of weeks before the wedding, the majority of the time, if you need to fill in the gap to transition to the next item on the agenda, all you need to do is to say, "Ladies and gentlemen" and launch straight into the next item -- provided you say "Ladies and gentlemen" with enough gusto. In the world of MC'ing, high energy and a positive attitude cover a multitude of sins. Suffice it to say that I found myself saying "Ladies and Gentlemen" many times over the course of the night.

I'm writing all of this down in case, seven years from now, I'm once again called upon to MC a friend's wedding. If you've stumbled across my blog because you've been called on to MC a wedding and find these suggestions helpful, please feel free to borrow from my experiences. Also, if you have any related suggestions or comments, please feel free to leave them below.