Financial-aid recipient Daniel Langhoff: Popular actor Daniel Langhoff most recently appeared as Quixote in Performance Now’s production of “The Man of La Mancha.” Other recent roles include Tateh, the immigrant single father in the Performance Now’s epic musical “Ragtime,” for which he won a 2016 True West Award. Before that, he played Dan in Town Hall Arts Center’s “Next to Normal.” “Daniel Langhoff gives his all in a moving performance,” Westword’s Juliet Wittman said of his work as the long-suffering husband. Before that he made his DCPA Theatre Company debut in “A Christmas Carol.” Langhoff, a graduate of Cherry Creek High School and the University of Northern Colorado, has been performing since third grade. Among his favorite roles along the way have been playing Younger Brother in the Arvada Center’s “Ragtime” and the Balladeer in Next Stage’s “Assassins.” He is married to noted local director and stage manager Rebecca Joseph, who helmed the first Denver staging of the Tony-winning best musical “In the Heights” for Vintage Theatre.
His initial story: Just a few months after Daniel and Rebecca welcomed daughter Clara into the world, Daniel was diagnosed with Stage 3 colon cancer and subsequently had the mass removed. The adjacent lymph nodes were removed along with the tumor. That was followed by 24 weeks of chemotherapy as a preventative measure to eliminate any microscopic cancer tissue that could still be there.
How we first helped: The Denver Actors Fund board of directors approved an initial gift of $2,000 to help Daniel and his family with their immediate needs. The Denver Actors Fund also encouraged the community to offer additional donations targeted to Langhoff, which brought in another $2,990. Local photographer Laura Mathews Siebert raised an additional $1,500 for the Langhoffs by hosting an all-day photo session. In July 2016, a PET scan revealed no detectable cancer in Langhoff’s body.
Update 1: Just as Daniel was beginning rehearsals for “Jesus Christ Superstar” at the Arvada Center in March 2017, he learned that a growth in his abdomen contains cancer cells. He left the musical to prepare for a diagnostic surgery that revealed even more tissue damage than doctors expected. “I am now fighting a new version of the same problem, and I am more physically compromised than I was before,” says Daniel. “But what I am dealing with is treatable, manageable and potentially still operable.” Next for Daniel are two auspicious trips to clinically advanced research centers – the University of Colorado Heath Center this week, and MD Anderson in Houston next month to determine the best treatment approach for Langhoff. The Denver Actors Fund has approved an additional $2,000 grant to assist the family with immediate expenses. This brings the grand total raised for Langhoff and his family through the Denver Actors Fund and subsequent community efforts to $14,020 – but the need remains great and ongoing.
Update 2: Daniel Langhoff died on November 12, just 10 days after the birth of his second daughter, Naomi. In just two weeks, the community contributed $36,984 in targeted donations through a special Denver Actors Fund initiative, all of which will go to Rebecca Joseph and will help her to provide for the future needs of her daughters. To date, the total amount of support for the Langhoff family through the Denver Actors Fund has risen to $75,388.
How you can help us help the Langhoff family: The Denver Actors Fund will continue to accept targeted donations to Rebecca Joseph. If you would like to direct a specific donation, simply mail checks made out to The Denver Actors Fund, P.O. Box 11182, Denver, CO 80212. Be sure to write Daniel Langhoff’s name in the topic field. Or use this donation link, and when asked where you would like your donation directed, use the “Langhoff Family” option in the pull-down menu. Or just tell us to direct your gift to Daniel’s family in the comment section.
A message from Daniel Langhoff (from 2016): “This year has presented me with more cataclysmic life changes than I’ve ever before experienced, both wonderful and challenging. My investigation, diagnosis, surgery, and chemotherapy has definitely been a challenge, but has also brought overwhelming support from this widespread and deeply compassionate theatre community. The grant I received from the Denver Actors Fund gives my family and me peace of mind, solace of heart, and enhances the idea that as we are many people and organizations that share this idiom and gift that is theatre; we really are one large family, and the outpouring from these people, and from the DAF, is a new example to me and mine of the magic inherent to our art that is our life. So many thanks are owed, and I’m happy to spend the rest of my life giving them.”
(Note: At the Denver Actors Fund, anonymity of aid recipients is presumed and fully protected, unless and until the recipient chooses to have his or her story told.)
