A painfully dull high school event sparked Emmett Spaw’s journey to creating his original play, “Three Shot,” produced in Owensboro, Kentucky.

“I was sitting at a debate tournament for eight hours, and I was bored enough that I was compelled to write an entire play,” Spaw, junior in theater, said. “I had it in my back pocket for a while, and I have been submitting plays out for over a year now. When I finally dug back into my old work, I decided to take ‘Three Shot’ and see if it gets anywhere.”

Eventually a production company sought out Spaw’s work to bring it to the stage. 

“This was the first time I have been reached out to regarding my work,” Spaw said. “Usually I submit a piece and I receive a ‘yay’ or ‘nay’ on if my work made it or not. A year ago I submitted “Three Shot” to them and was rejected, but the company kept it in their back pocket, and their director reached out to me recently, and asked if I would be willing to publish it now.”

The play was produced March 23 by the Theatre Workshop of Owensboro in a comedy crawl event named “Comedy Crawl, It’s T.W.O. Funny.”

“‘Three Shot’ is the soapiest and goofiest short play I have ever written,” Spaw said. “It is basically about a cowboy with a troubled past who wanders into a bar and adapts a new lifestyle towards the end. It features ample use of thick country accents.”

At each of six bars, a 30-minute comedy sketch was performed, and signature menu items were available to buy accompanying the plays.

“Three Shot” was performed at Brasher’s Little Nashville, where Spaw received a royalty payment for the performance. The signature drink accompanying the play was the Salted Caramel Whiskey Sour.

“I owe a lot to the K-State theater program, not only in terms of navigating things like this but also in terms of the faculty being so helpful as I have been learning how to write and [faculty] supporting my writing,” Spaw said. “Shannon Skelton and David Mackay have been so supportive of my writing, helping me learn how to grow as a writer and helping me navigate the whole process of getting my work published.”

Spaw plans to continue writing and producing his work. He will feature in K-State’s upcoming show “The Comedy of Errors” by William Shakespeare.