Status Anxiety

Toby Young

Wednesday, 24th June 2009

By my epic standards, this was an extremely polite best man’s speech

It never ceases to amaze me that I am still asked to speak in public. If I am not the worst orator of my generation, I must be a close second. The last time I performed an after-dinner speaking gig was in Bath and the organisation concerned was so appalled it asked for its money back. ‘My delegates are not prudes,’ wrote the booker to my agent, ‘but the use of the “C” word in polite company is to me unacceptable and to use it twice was just insult to injury.’

In my defence, both uses of ‘C’ word occurred in the course of telling a single anecdote about encountering Gordon Ramsay on a flight back from Los Angeles. I came across him in one of the galleys, bent double over a stainless steel work surface and looking like he’d just personally prepared 375 meals. Thinking this was too good an opportunity to miss, I marched up to him and tapped him on the shoulder. ‘I hate to have to say this, Mr Ramsay, but both the chicken and the beef were an absolute disgrace,’ I said. As I told the audience in Bath, the foul-mouthed restaurateur took this in remarkably good part: ‘He called me a c***, but not a f***ing c***.’

In retrospect, perhaps this was not the best story to tell the Association of Retired Librarians.

I have never mentioned this to my friend James Lewisohn, but I was still surprised when he asked me to be his best man last Saturday. He has read my memoir, The Sound of No Hands Clapping, and therefore knows all about the best man speech I gave in 2000. This was at the wedding of my friend Sean Macaulay, whose sister, Sarah, is married to the Prime Minister. Not only was Gordon present, but so too was the then editor of The Times. My opening gag went as follows: ‘Sean told me he’s feeling very relaxed tonight. It’s the first wedding he’s ever been to in which he doesn’t feel guilty about having f***ed the bride the night before.’

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Roger Beaumont

June 29th, 2009 2:24pm Report this comment

"....my speech about James was a hagiographic eulogy."

A what?!!

James Jackson

July 4th, 2009 12:19pm Report this comment

Very funny Toby - if only there were more folk with your witty, self deprecating humour - far more amusing than the dry, cynical sneering that's become so very fashionable.

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