Article about Actors Ensemble's home at John Hinkel Park
Here’s a review of the article “Berkeley’s John Hinkel Park is a ‘dream world, green world’ for theater and nature lovers” by Nathan Dalton, published October 1, 2025, in Berkeleyside.
Nathan Dalton’s Berkeleyside feature captures the layered life of John Hinkel Park, where art, history, and community intersect beneath Berkeley’s redwoods. The 4.2-acre park, gifted to the city in 1919 by banker John Hinkel, remains both “a natural space” and a stage for local creativity. Dalton opens with a vivid tableau: children playing, parents chatting, and a troupe rehearsing The Taming of the Shrew at the stone amphitheater — an image that defines the park’s balance of play and performance.
At the heart of the article is the Actors Ensemble of Berkeley, a 68-year-old community theater company that stages two productions annually at the park. Longtime director Stanley Spenger calls the setting “perfect for Shakespeare … kind of an ‘As You Like It’ dream world, green world.” The Ensemble has helped keep the amphitheater alive after earlier troupes, including Cal Shakes, outgrew the space. Their collaboration with the city during the park’s recent $1 million renovation led to thoughtful upgrades — from new seating to a redesigned stage equipped for fabric sets and accessible pathways for all audiences.
Dalton traces the park’s long performance lineage, from the 1930s Civil Works Administration construction to the wild 1960s “Floating Lotus Magic Opera Company” and the Shakespeare festivals that followed. Through it all, John Hinkel Park has remained a meeting ground — “a place for Boy Scout troops and acting troupes,” where laughter, dialogue, and birdsong coexist.
Blending lush description with historical insight, Dalton’s piece honors both the park’s founders and its present-day stewards. His portrait of the Actors Ensemble affirms community theater as a civic art — sustained not by glamour, but by love of performance and place. In Hinkel’s “dream world, green world,” Berkeley’s spirit of imagination continues to take the stage.
Link to article: “Berkeley’s John Hinkel Park is a ‘dream world, green world’ for theater and nature lovers”
