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Media Credit: Britni Crocker Ferrell, SNL alum and star of Anchorman, addressed a packed Shriver Hall last Thursday.

Expectations ran high last Thursday as students packed Shriver Hall to full capacity to hear a speech from celebrity, actor and comedian Will Ferrell.

Ferrell kept the audience, as well as the hosting Milton S. Eisenhower Symposium (MSE) staff, guessing until the very end as to the subject his speech would cover and whether it would relate to MSE's theme of "Partnership, Progress, and Prosperity in a Changing America."

"We have no idea what [Ferrell] is going to speak about," MSE staffer Jesse McDermeit said before Ferrell's speech. "We like to keep it open. He chooses what he wants to speak about. It might relate [to our theme], it might not."

"I have no idea what to expect," senior Chris Viemeister agreed. "I came here because I am a fan of Will Ferrell. I love his movies and his characters."

Most of all, Viemeister and others agreed, "I hope he's funny."

Upon Ferrell's entrance onstage, the crowd, composed mostly of students, burst into applause and gave Ferrell a standing ovation.

"I know what you're thinking," Ferrell joked as the applause died down. "God, he's so good-looking."

After thanking the University and MSE for inviting him to speak, Ferrell launched into his speech, punctuated frequently by peals of audience laughter.

"When I was asked to speak at this symposium," he said, "a number of questions ran through my mind. The first being, 'what is a symposium?'"

Ferrell explained that in ancient Greece, a 'symposium' was a drinking party "filled with music and philosophical conversation."

"Now I get it," Ferrell said, promptly cracking open a Budweiser beer and taking several sips from the can amidst audience cheers, whistles and chants to "chug, chug, chug."

"Tucker Carlson must have gotten hammered," he joked after setting his beer down on the podium, a reference to the political commentator's MSE-hosted speech earlier this year.

After speaking briefly about growing up in California, in which he claimed his name from birth was Johns William Ferrell, his childhood hobbies were to make exclusive pieces of jewelry from baby teeth and fashion hand-sewn yarmulkes for cats, and he was let go from Saturday Night Live for repeatedly bringing concealed weapons into the studio, Ferrell launched into his main topic of the night.

Continued...

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