Actor Jon Bernthal, known for his roles in The Walking Dead, The Bear, and the recently released The Accountant 2, has been an Ojai resident for over a decade, raising a family with his wife in the small community. In that time, he’s seen the fabric of the town change drastically. Like much of the Central Coast, Ojai has undergone a recent population reshuffle due to wildfire devastation and people seeking refuge from COVID lockdowns in congested urban areas. “Ojai has always been a place where folks like me moved because we wanted to put family first,” says Bernthal. “And slowly but surely, a lot of folks have opted to bring their own culture rather than celebrate the culture that’s here. Being one of those — for lack of a better word — L.A. jerks who came up here … I really wanted to give something back to this community that I love so much.”
As outside wealth ousts Ojai natives, Bernthal notes that the public schools have become a casualty of shrinking enrollment and budgets as property values skyrocket. “I’m very dear friends with many of the people that teach at Nordhoff Junior/High School … and the talent coming out of that school and the talent from that teaching staff is so unbelievable,” he says. “But there’s less and less money … anything that we can do to bolster it, anything we can do to highlight how wonderful these teachers are, especially the theater and dance departments — I’m going to do it.”
The husband-and-wife team behind the beloved performing arts programs at Nordhoff are John and Kim Hoj, both three decades deep in their education careers. A lifelong dancer, Kim Hoj began as a psychology teacher but had the opportunity to start a dance program at Nordhoff in 2004. What began as a single class with 20 students has evolved over the last two decades into four classes and a student dance company. John Hoj began as a history teacher but eventually took over the theater program with what he calls a very “blue-collar” approach: “I’m continually growing with the students,” he explains, “figuring out all the different elements and parts — learning by doing.”
Bernthal and his team of collaborators have spearheaded the refurbishment of a downtown theater space intended for use by the Nordhoff performing arts departments. The theater, an old auditorium that sees limited use, can seat around 300 — a nice upgrade from Hoj’s current space, which seats about 50. A team of hotshot theater professionals from Los Angeles were hired to come in and re-envision the space. “We put in a state-of-the-art light grid and sound system, and we’re building a proper black box with seating within the theater,” says Bernthal. “The idea is for the Nordhoff theater department and dance department to go forward and use it for their own productions.”…