Ghostwriting
Uncovered

Can AI write your wedding speech? A professional ghostwriter weighs in.

June 8, 2023

Your wedding date is fast approaching and you may be wondering, “Can ChatGPT write my wedding speech?” I put the AI tool to the test. My verdict? It depends.

By Wendy Dennis

Is there anyone who isn’t using ChatGPT these days? You can scarcely turn around without hearing how AI can do everything from write jokes and college-level essays to diagnose diseases and fight human trafficking. It’s also threatening to come for our jobs, compromise our elections and make human beings redundant, but hey, you can’t have everything. 

I’ve been using ChatGPT for meal planning, trip planning and basic research tasks, and find it nothing short of miraculous. I’ve remained somewhat more skeptical, however, of its ability to write a wedding speech – at least a high-quality one, which is the only kind I want to hear or deliver. But when Stephen Marche, a writer whose work I admire, used AI to write a mystery novel, and it got pretty good reviews, I decided to put ChatGPT to the test, and see if it could write a wedding speech that does what a great one is supposed to do, which is distill your thoughts and feelings about the person you’re honoring into a touching, funny story that rings true, captures their essence, and does it all in roughly five minutes. 

Is ChatGPT up to the task?

In my view, no. For one thing, expressing heartfelt emotion and a point of view, which are the lifeblood of any great wedding speech, are not its strong suits – at least not yet. And since you have to curate the direction you give it, then direct it, redirect it, and edit the results, the wedding speech it delivers will only be as good as the direction, curation, and editing you provide. (In Marche’s case, the process required painstaking effort on his part.) But therein lies the problem, because when I consider the startlingly high number of mind-numbingly boring or downright cringy wedding speeches delivered in any given year, as well as the details clients routinely want me to include in theirs (until I steer them in another direction), most people don’t know how to make sound judgments. And while some people have a clear idea of what they want to say, many need help articulating their thoughts and feelings, hence the service that I provide. If you’re unsure, a chatbot isn’t going to help you. There’s also the matter of tone, since words have many shades of meaning, and the wrong one can land in a very different way than you intended. 

Another problem – and it’s a big one – is that in order to make wise decisions about which details to include and which ones to leave out, you have to think about your wedding speech from the audience’s point of view. In my experience, most people don’t, which invariably leads them to make bad choices. Just think about all the inside jokes you’ve heard Best Men deliver about the groom, which is exclusionary by definition since they’re meant for an audience of one. Or the sophomoric stories some people think are hilarious. 

Parents often like to use their time at the podium to rhyme off a listicle of their kid’s academic achievements. They’re proud their kid got into a prestigious school. I get it. But a speech like that which is designed to impress – I call it The Resume Speech – is guaranteed to be a snore because your kid’s resume isn’t what your audience is looking for. (If they are, they can go on LinkedIn). What they want — and it’s your duty to provide – is a speech from the heart about what makes your kid uniquely, lovably, and yes, irritatingly, them. In other words, you have to show the audience who they are, not tell them. And the way to do that is by telling them an engaging story. (If you just feed the chatbot facts, you won’t get a wedding speech. You’ll get a report.) While some AI tools prompt you to provide the details of a memorable story, you still have to make authorial decisions. Which is why if you want to deliver a speech that does justice to your loved one and brings them to life for your audience, you need to know what does – and doesn’t—constitute storytelling gold. 

In the end, whether a chatbot is a good option for you comes down to your needs, standards and taste. In a recent New York Times piece about the different ways people are using AI, an officiant who’d procrastinated about composing remarks for a friend’s wedding until a few hours before the event and turned to GPT-3 for help, reportedly said the first version was generic and full of platitudes, but after steering the chatbot (i.e. telling it the groom was a “great lover of plants”), it came back with “beautiful metaphors” and he “nailed” it. The Times didn’t publish his remarks, so readers couldn’t judge for themselves whether he had, in fact, nailed it according to their standards. I’d argue that unless you’re a brilliant off-the-cuff orator, if you leave composing your speech until the last minute you’re probably not heavily invested in its quality. Standards, in other words, are relative. Which is why your degree of satisfaction with a chatbot-written wedding speech will depend heavily on yours. 

What AI Delivers

When I told ChatGPT I needed a five-minute wedding speech about my daughter, and fed it the kind of generic details clients often give me until I dig a little deeper – star student, went to Ivey School of Business, loves sports and traveling – here’s what it delivered: 

Ladies and gentlemen

I stand before you as one proud parent, honored to give the wedding speech about my daughter. She is an amazing person who has accomplished so much in her life and has a bright future ahead of her. 

As many of you know, my daughter is a star student. She has always been dedicated to her education, and it shows. She excelled in high school and went on to attend the prestigious Ivey School of Business, where she further honed her skills and learned valuable lessons that will serve her well in her career.

But my daughter is not just a scholar; she is also an accomplished athlete. She loves sports and has been involved in various teams and leagues throughout her life. Her commitment to fitness and competition is an inspiration to us all.

And if that wasn’t enough, my daughter also has a passion for traveling. She has visited many places around the world and has a keen sense of adventure. Her travels have broadened her perspective and given her a unique outlook on life. 

But what I am most proud of about my daughter is not her accomplishments, but the person she has become. She is kind, compassionate and makes everyone around her feel special.

Now, as my daughter embarks on this new journey with her partner, I want to say that I am thrilled for her. I know that she will continue to achieve great things and make a positive impact on the world. I am confident that she will be an amazing partner to her new spouse, and together they will create a beautiful life full of love, laughter and adventure.

To my daughter and her new spouse, I wish you all the happiness in the world. May your love for each other continue to grow and blossom, and may your life together be filled with joy, peace, and contentment. Congratulations.

Granted that was just my first try.  

I’ve heard people say that ChatGPT is like having an intern, and for certain tasks, I’d agree. A chatbot is your friend, if:

1. You just want a plug-and-play speech with a beginning, middle and end.

2. You don’t mind platitudes and clichés, or you’re looking for vows written in Shakespearean English.

3. You only need a framework that will give you a starting point to write your own speech

If, however, you want a speech for the ages, learn more about what a professional ghostwriter can do for you. Otherwise, I’d advise you to temper your expectations. Like many interns, ChatGPT works for free, and you’ll get what you pay for.

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