The video mercifully ended, and the large singer walked up to speak. He was sanctimonious and pompous, in love with his own speaking voice, and thoroughly obnoxious. By this point, the program was already 90 minutes long. I had to check my cell phone to confirm that time had dragged by to that extent. (Other attendees watched the proceedings with their phones in the air, taking their own home movies, while other were checking messages and websites. Three times a phone rang. You know how I feel about that.)
Then my friend’s older brother got up to speak. He was clearly the main event, so I abandoned my plan to say a few well-chosen words as a representative of the two theater companies I ran in which my friend was a major contributor. The brother did one of those “unaccustomed as I am to public speaking” routines, carried pages of notes, and droned on and on, sometimes coherent, sometimes mumbling, teasing us with hints that he might be winding up, then starting on a new tangent. His speech lasted another 40 minutes. The room was set up with the speakers by the only exit, so only two people left during this filibuster.
The last speaker was my friend’s ex-common law wife. Now she knew how to speak; she was animated and funny. Also surprising (or, perhaps nuts): she said that a medium had told her she was George Sand in a previous life, and she believed her. The medium also said that my friend had been Franz Liszt. When the sort-of spouse finished I bolted for the door before anyone else was tempted to speak. I had been sitting for more than two hours.
I hate to be judgmental, but I managed one of these for my wife in 2024. It isn’t that hard to avoid turning memorials into ordeals for the guests. Like any other event, it just takes planning, consideration and common sense.
And, perhaps, a hook for speakers who abuse the privilege.
Ethics Alarms 
I’m sorry you had to go through this, Jack. But I suspect that you also know that this story, as told, is side-splittingly hilarious (and nicely packaged as such).
I doubt I’ve met anyone who actually likes going to funerals and/or memorial services (with billions of people in the world, I’m sure there are such folks – but at least they’re not obvious about it). Is it really to much to ask that those organizing such an event recognize that fact, and works to optimize the flow?
Apparently it is. Clueless people sometimes take special occasions as opportunities to stage-manage disaster, in pursuit of ego-boosting perfection. The best analog I can give was the wedding of one of my cousins, which began with a prelude by the World’s Smallest String Quartet (only three of ’em showed up, and beyond the prelude they played incidental music for the rest of it. String quartets REALLY need that cello, especially if the viola player is shaky). As if that were insufficient bad music, there was a mid-event performance by a singer-songwriter friend of the Happy Couple, who debuted a bespoke paean to them roughly equivalent in length to the first two movements of Yes’s Tales from Topgraphic Oceans. Oh, and for good measure, the service included a full Mass, which was particularly curious in that just about everyone in attendance, including the the bride and groom, were Episcopalian.
So I guess I answer my own question. No, clueless people will NEVER optimize the flow, because they don’t understand the first thing about it, and they’ll feature idiots who don’t understand that the event isn’t about themselves in the first place. Thus, such people will continue to dish out agonizing events without ever understanding that they were disasters, and all that we can hope for is that 1) we never have to attend one of their productions again, and 2) they never have the opportunity to produce one in our honor.
At least my cousin’s wedding had open bars featuring 1) top-shelf booze and 2) non-stop, shucked-to-order local shellfish. That made up for a lot. Take it from me: continuous champagne and all-you-can-eat oysters-on-the-half can do a lot to wash away prior boredom and insult, especially when surround by compatriots who were equally bored and insulted, and who wish to crack wise about it. The day proved wonderful indeed. I presume that you weren’t afforded similar compensation.
But good on you for going to your colleague’s service. It was the right thing to do.
Thanks. I was on a Zoom memorial during the pandemic, and one of the people on it just monopolized the session, talking about eternity and love and loyalty and then after boring everyone stiff, said he had never personally met the deceased!!!! It reminded me of that gag in “Mean Girls,” where a female student gives an impassioned speech about the importance of getting along, then admits that she doesn’t even go to school there.
This is the first EA post that would make a great short story. Particularly the George Sand and Franz Liszt part. But I have to ask, if she is George Sand, shouldn’t the husband have been Frederic Chopin? Hilarious.
“I had been sitting for more than two hours.”
The mind can embrace only as much as the seat can endure.
PWS
I was tabbed to be one of the people to eulogize my best friend at his funeral service in an Episcopal church in Connecticut. Everyone was given a strict three-minute time limit. Which caused me to scribble out the text of what I wanted to say, which I had, foolishly, intended to ad lib. I read my bit, like everyone else, observing the three-minute time limit, and all was well.