Why You Should Stop Asking Your Friends for (Free) Wedding Help

Comedian Judy Batalion on what it's really like to be a guest who works the wedding.

Judy Batalion - Harper’s Bazaar
August 10, 2016

I stared at the oversized mauve envelope in my postbox, its golden calligraphy calling out: wedding season. I imagined the upcoming flurry of passion, romance, Champagne.

Then I worried.

I pictured the endless things I'd been asked to do in the past: be a guest, witness, chauffeur, shower-game planner and to help set up the step-parent-hosted breakfast. A busy working mom, I was daunted by the wedding workload.

I was a comic who'd gotten married at 31, before many of my peers. I gave a 25-minute filibuster at my own connubials, much to the chagrin of the caterer who was making strangulation signs at me, hissing, enough already, you're ruining the fish. Regardless, my speech was a success, catalyzing my role as The Wedding Speaker.

At first, I was honored by this responsibility to give toasts. I was an enormous fan of nuptials. My miraculous marriage rescued me from a dysfunctional family. My 200-person wedding was my most joyful event. Since then, I cried at ceremonies and could often be found in the center of hora circles doing the running man. I felt so blessed that an awkward blind-date at a ukulele concert turned into my life's stability, and karmically responsible to help others celebrate their matches.

Just a month after tying my own knot, I was—on the beach, on my honeymoon—madly scribbling speech notes, preparing to MC my graduate-schoolmate's wedlock. Two nights before the big California event, the bride sat me down with a few light requests. "Can you try to include my estranged father who'll be there with his 22-year-old girlfriend but don't mention her. Also, there'll be a lot of psychiatrists there, so it would be good if you could address them—in Yiddish." I was instructed about timing, family history ("my father-in-law doesn't speak to my mother's cousin's 8th husband, but don't worry, he's dead"), everything—except the fact that I'd be overseeing the night from an outdoors stage that was separated from the rest of the guests by a lake. I tried to rally the attention of avid buffet goers as I presented unique introductions to all ten bridesmaids—while staying sober. Sheltering from Pacific wind gales, I envied the bridal party's tipsy toasts, not to mention long skirts, panicked that I'd done a substandard job and let my friend down.

When I was eight months pregnant, another bride asked if I wouldn't mind toasting her at her Southern shindig. "Just do whatever you did at your affair," she requested, beaming.

"OK," I answered, "I'll make jokes about the economic collapse of 2008."

"Yeah, funny, do that kind of thing."

That kind of thing was so hard, I wanted to say, requiring research, delivery, memorization, drafts in which I'd try to wind together touching anecdotes, humor, character portraits and non-cliched tips on married life. Also, I gave that speech at MY wedding, filled with everyone who'd ever liked me, many in utter relief that I'd gotten hitched. It was easy to mock myself and my husband in front of the most compassionate audience I could imagine. Less easy to mock my friend and her husband in front of his insane parents who I'd only just met in the toilet. Also my wedding was in England so everyone was drunk.

As more chums got hitched, I was asked to edit programs and tweak ceremony notes, coach delivery and choreograph first dances, attend dress fittings and veil debates (where was the champagne from the movies?), and advise on software for non-traditional gift registries. Thank god I was a terrible cook.

Then there were the costs: of course I'd never expect to be paid, yet like an internship I couldn't afford, I was paying—for travel, babysitters, gifts, gender-neutral bridal-groomal weekends in Long Island, Massachusetts, Ireland. Not to mention the wardrobe I had to purchase now that every event was publicized on social media and I'd once noted that I appeared in the same old Betsy Johnson frock with 8 different backgrounds.

Weeks after birthing my second child, I found myself under a chuppah, co-officiating a marriage alongside a rabbi (who was, the bride mentioned, getting paid $2,000). I'd done family research and, as instructed, geared my humor toward an older Jewish crowd only to find the event peopled with 20-something Japanese graphic designers. The sister maids-of-honor, eyed me with disdain, as if it should have been them up there (it should have). The father whispered to me, "thanks, but our family came on the boat from Russia, not Poland." I spent the evening hiding in the bathroom, worried I'd offended everyone, watching the bridesmaids from the cracks in the stall as they shimmied with coiffed fringes and whining camaraderie.

And wasn't that always the case? While I'd nervously paced in the bathroom practicing my opening, I'd glance at the bridesmaids comparing their gift bags, fluffing each other's bangs and rolling their eyes. Oh I know it's trauma to wake up early, wear a color you don't like, and god forbid, a dress with the wrong cut, but you're getting your make-up done! All you have to do is walk.

I stared at these women in envy, wondering why, of all my wedding tasks, I'd never been one of them, not once. I had close female friends, but was never naturally part of a girl gaggle. It was lonely "working weddings," responsible for carrying evenings, making moods, not-hurting a whole tribe of relations, alone.

I too wanted a dress that hugged my awkward hips and make-up that made me look like a middle-aged drag queen. If you're going to ask me to compose a comic novel about your messy relationship, at least treat me to a manicure so when I looked down at my trembling fingers clutching thick stack of worn cue cards, something shiny was looking back up.

Now, I looked down at the envelope I was holding, all birdies and swirls. I sighed, recalling my own invitation logo: cartoon hearts, my cartoon glasses, his cartoon bald head. Truth was, I loved weddings.

So I tore open the envelope to find a simple, elegant card. No bridesmaid request, alas, but also, no handwritten notes asking if I wouldn't mind just writing their vows for them. Then again—I read—the ceremony was being held in the French countryside, to take place over four days. "We love your kids," the invite said. "But there's no room for them at our party." Also, guests were to indicate how many beds they'd like to rent in the communally shared yurts.

I loved weddings. To a point. "I'm so sorry, but I can't make it," I emailed right away. Then, guilty, I opened their on-line gift registry and bought them a set of knives.