Healy found the former clown car—a perfect stand-in for a 1915 Stutz Bearcat—on Craigslist, negotiated a rental with the Chicago owner, and hired a tow truck to deliver it to campus.

Now the only problem was figuring out how to get the car into “tiny Hixon Hall,” he said. “It’s a feat in any theater. In ours, it definitely was improbable.”

But not impossible. Hixon Hall was a built in 1910 as a carriage house. Unseen from Sheridan Road are a trio of arched openings in the red-brick wall wide enough for a carriage—or a car—to pass through easily.

Healy got permission to temporarily remove the windows that cover the former stall doorways and to knock down an unoriginal interior wall. With an opening in place, Healy could get the car inside—if only it could move.

“The car had been sitting so long, its front wheels weren’t spinning,” Healy said.

Luckily, Mother Nature stepped in the day the car was delivered. A fresh snowfall made it possible for Healy and a half-dozen students to slowly push the yellow auto up the driveway to the newly opened doorway.

“Once we got up to the building, the calipers unlocked so we were able to roll it up a ramp and right into the building,” Healy said. “In a way, the snow and ice was to our benefit.”

Now Healy has direct backstage access for future productions. “They will be my permanent loading doors to get materials into the theater,” he said.

"Failure: A Love Story"