Themes in A
W ed d in g S to ry
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volving at least two major steps. First, the producers make arrangements to tape
various statements that participants make to interviewers, to each other, and occa
sionally to family members and friends. Next, the video footage of these utter
ances is edited and compressed to fit the format of the show. The result is a series
of brief clips, alternating back-and-forth between bride and groom, that provide a
chronological representation of the history of the relationship.
In this article we focus on the opening segment because it is there that the
couple, in cooperation with the show’s producers, constructs the history of their
relationship, from its formation to the wedding.
Common Themes
Theme 1: Love Happens—It is Destiny
Sociologist Charles d o c k (1993) argues that one of the major ways in which
Americans explain people’s behavior and the events in the world around them is
by ascribing those actions and events to supernatural control agents. However that
supernatural agent is identified—as God, fate, destiny, luck—Americans often re
fer to such an agent as a way of making sense of the world in which they live. Our
analysis of the narratives in A Wedding Story supports his argument. Indeed, we
found variations of this theme again and again. Participants frequently explained
the progression and very existence of their relationships as something more or less
written in the stars.
In one interesting episode, the participants describe the too-peculiar-to-berandom happenings that spawned their relationship. As a youth, Brian watched his
father compete against a famous racecar driver, who became his idol. Years later,
after Brian met Kimberly at a race track, they discovered that a fan letter Brian had
written to her father was still in her dad’s possession, as was a copy of the response
Brian received. The relationship progressed quickly from there. Looking back,
during their interviews, Brian and Kimberly invoke destiny and fate to make sense
of the fact that they found each other and became a couple.
Brian: Now when I think about this destiny thing, everybody’s heard
about it before. When you live 90 miles apart from somebody and then
you meet this beautiful girl and—and then I found out it was [a wellknown race-car driver’s] daughter, you know, he’s just one of my idols all
my life and I—I thought...what’s goin’ on here?
Kimberly: I think it’s very ironic that people that live that far apart that
don’t know each other for twenty some years can just find true happiness
and love at a racetrack-1 don’t know.
Brian: Everybody we tell about it just can’t believe it, you know, it’s
pretty amazing. She just knocked me off my feet.