After the passing of a student actor who loved to sing, silence accompanies a home filled with instruments she played, marigolds she loved and her piano adorned with pictures of her as a baby.
All of these details in the Johnson home showed the family’s commitment to remembering their daughter, Daisy Johnson who passed in April, a month after starring as the lead female actress in LBCC’s musical “In the Heights.”
LBCC continues to remember and honor Daisy through the creation of a scholarship in her name, The Daisy Johnson Memorial Scholarship, which will be given to students in future musicals, acknowledging Daisy’s love for theater.
Actors surround Daisy Johnson, center, who played Nina in LBCC’s production of “In the Heights” on Mar. 4. (File photo)
Daisy Johnson sings as “Nina” during a dress rehearsal for “In the Heights” on Mar. 4. (File photo)
Daisy’s parents shared that she started singing when she was just 4 years old, being self-taught until attending The Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute, an acting school with alumni like Marilyn Monroe, Lady Gaga and Angelina Jolie, where Daisy was awarded a $60,000 scholarship to study at.
Daisy’s parents recalled memories of her passion for singing with laughter, while taking pauses in between stories to cry.
Andrew Johnson and Veronica Johnson, light up as they share stories of their daughter’s childhood with The Viking News in their home. (Isaiah Ryan)
“She was the light of this house. This house now, without her, is so quiet. … The voice that you can hear in this house was always Daisy, talking, singing,” Daisy’s mother, Veronica Johnson, said. “She’d go to her room and she practiced and practiced. Sometimes she was so loud I would say, ‘hey, you need to stop, the neighbors, you know, they’re sleeping’.”
Her father, Andrew Johnson, described the grief that he and his family have gone through, and still continue to experience.
“It was just like a wave of pain and then you just start to realize there’s no way to get around this. You have to go through it. … My wife’s family lives in Ensenada. When we were down there at my sister in law’s house, and it was just laying in bed and just having this unimaginable amount of pain. And then the only thing you can do is endure it, and then you get through it, and then there’s another one. … Just being at the beach with constant amounts of pain,” Andrew said. “It’s probably true what my grandma said, you know, that losing people for everybody is hard, but losing a child is probably the hardest.”
Daisy’s parents remember her as kind and super friendly, emphasizing that she even had a lasting impact on people who she just met, with Veronica mentioning a friend Daisy made while working at a LBCC tutoring center, saying that although he knew her for just a month, it felt like he knew her for years.
“That’s what a lot of people say,” Veronica said. “When you know Daisy, you don’t need to know her for a long time, she was so friendly, she had so much love and she was so transparent, so unique that yeah, it was easy to get along with Daisy.”
Veronica recalled a moment from Daisy’s childhood, when her friendliness posed trouble.
“I say ‘Daisy, you can’t trust everybody mama, not everybody’s your friend,’… But it’s how she was, she had too much love,” Veronica said.
For Dia de los Muertos, the family made a large ofrenda, a traditional Mexican alter, in their home, placing marigolds on the floor around a cross alongside the instruments she used to play, and made a second ofrenda diorama that decorated the shelf where Daisy’s ashes rest with candles and toys.
The ofrenda that the Johnson family built in their home in memory of Daisy Johnson for Dia de los Muertos. Photo courtesy of Andrew Johnson.
Daisy Johnson’s ashes are decorated with a Dia de los Muertos diorama, a braid of her hair and crown from her belated quincenera celebration. Daisy’s quincenera was postponed until she was 18 years old because of COVID-19, and one day she was suprised by her family with a dress. She was able to celebrate the day with her friends, with Veronica describing the experience for Daisy as “a dream come true for her.” (Isaiah Ryan)
Daisy loved Dia de los Muertos despite the family rarely celebrating it because of their religious beliefs. This year, the family was willing to adopt the holiday and decorate for her.
“Daisy had this passion for Dia de Muertos. It was like, she feels so excited with all these colors, this flower, she loved these flowers, the smell, and all the colors and everything,” Veronica said.
While attending The Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute, Daisy enrolled at LBCC where she met Skye Angulo, vocal studies professor and vocal music director of “In the Heights,” who would go on to put a scholarship in her name into motion
Andrew shared that Angulo helped “refine” Daisy’s voice during “In the Heights.”
“(Daisy) always loved Whitney (Houston) and different people that did stuff like that, but I felt like she had a very Adele thing going on, where it was just very simple and very powerful and I think Skye really helped her get there,” Andrew said. “We heard her sing all the time, but there’s a difference between singing in the house and singing in a theater, and the first time I heard what was there in the opening, I was like ‘Wow.’ She actually got better.”
The first musical that The Daisy Johnson Memorial Scholarship will be awarded at is in the upcoming spring musical “Into the Woods,” where during the last show, three $1,000 scholarships will be given to a cast, crew and orchestra member
The scholarship requirements are minimal, only needing students to be in the musical and enrolled at LBCC.
Angulo mentioned that the intense rehearsal schedules of musicals can cause financial strains on students, as it’s difficult to manage both the long rehearsal hours and working a job, which the scholarship serves to overcome.
“These cast members and crew members and orchestra members, they work tirelessly because they love it and they want to be in the show and they want to reach others. They want that audience to really feel inspired and fulfilled,” Angulo, who is the main facilitator and creator of the scholarship, said.
In order for the scholarship to continue running based on interest, the Long Beach City College Foundation needs to raise a minimum of $25,000.
Letty Totah, Manager of Operations and Scholarships at The Long Beach City College Foundation explained the math involved with the scholarship, saying that based on reports from stock experts, who examine the successful rate interest of stocks, a 4% interest is a safe return to rely on.
Four percent of the $25,000 that the scholarship needs to raise is $1,000, meaning that the scholarship will be able to award one student in the long run if it reaches its minimum, meaning the more money donated, the more scholarships that can be given to students in the upcoming musicals at LBCC.
Although the $25,000 goal hasn’t been met yet, three students from “Into the Woods” will receive the scholarship from the $3,000 that Superintendent President Mike Munoz donated to jumpstart the scholarship.
Munoz pitched the scholarship to Angulo at a gathering in the school’s auditorium for Daisy’s passing, saying that he wanted to start a scholarship in Daisy’s name.
“He came to meet with us and to grieve with us, which was so touching,” Angulo said. “It was after that meeting that he approached me and he said ‘Sky, I am very affected by this and I’m very moved. I want to help … set up a scholarship in her name for future years.’”
Angulo mentioned that Munoz understood that she wasn’t ready at that moment to move forward with the process, and he reassured her that the opportunity would be open until she was. Angulo reached out to Munoz in the summer, and worked with a team at LBCC’s Foundation to set up the scholarship.
Totah didn’t share an estimate of how many donations the scholarship has received so far, but mentioned the scholarship was just started “in the last few weeks” and that the LBCC Scholarship Foundation “only just started advertising for it, so I don’t think they’ve hit very much yet.”
Andrew expressed his support for the scholarship, hoping that it will provide for students in the theater community.
“I’d love to see it grow. I’d love it to be worth more than they’re aiming for. That’ll be something I pray for. It’s like, I’d love to see it be worth 50, 75, 100,000, and where it’s growing and just helping those kids, … I was able to help Daisy get through, we had a car for her, a home for her, and some kids want to go, and they don’t have the support, the parents can’t or they don’t have them, or there’s a lot of things. So those would be the ones I want (to receive the scholarship), but you know, I trust (the faculty who will decide the recipients),” Andrew said.
Daisy’s caring personality, musical talent, and friendliness are ways in which her loved ones will remember her by.
A photo of Daisy Johnson displayed on a shelf in the Johnson family’s home. (Isaiah Ryan)
Veronica Johnson, mother of Daisy Johnson, holds her daughter’s guitar and microphone with images of Daisy on her nails at their home. (Isaiah Ryan)
Andrew Johnson and Veronica Johnson, parents of Daisy Johnson, hold Daisy’s lego flowers during a portrait in their home where they shared memories of their daughter with The Viking News. Daisy’s parents shared that Daisy loved legos, and that when she got her first pay check from working at McDonald’s, the second thing she bought was a $350 lego Ninjago castle. (Isaiah Ryan)
At LBCC, Daisy made history by being one of the cast members in LBCC’s first musical in 18 years where she performed powerful ballads in her lead female role as “Nina” in “In the Heights.”
Veronica expressed that Daisy left behind a legacy that she wishes Daisy knew about.
“I think that she don’t have (an) idea that after she passed away, she leave behind all those things. Like the time that was the memorial in the church here, like it was almost like 400 people that was there. A lot of people, … loved her so much,” Veronica said.
Anyone interested in donating to The Daisy Johnson Memorial Scholarship can follow the link to help it reach it’s $25,000 goal.
You must be logged in to post a comment.