Exclusive: The Chase Australia’s Tiger Mum, Cheryl Toh finally opens up about her private life
“I’ve been married for 20 years, two kids… I think I’m a pretty average lady in my mid-forties,” jokes the 44-year-old as she sits down to grab some lunch after our photoshoot in Sydney.
An average lady with a not-so-average side gig! Cheryl says she has fellow Chaser Issa Schultz, aka The Supernerd, to thank for helping her land her spot on the Aussie series.
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“I’ve been friends for more than 10 years with Issa, and when the show first launched they had Anne Hegerty, who’s just wonderful, and then the producers decided, ‘Well, what about some Australian female talent?’ So they put the word out. Issa recommended a couple of friends and then we all auditioned.”
Now, she says all the Chasers are “very much a team”.
“We’ve got a WhatsApp group that we exchange interesting trivia on or talk about things that are happening in the quizzing world,” says Cheryl, who’s a big fan of their lovable host, TV legend Larry Emdur, 59.
“Larry’s a wonderful man, a true gentleman,” she shares.
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“He’s extremely professional. Always punctual. And really considerate of everybody that works on the show. For our last day of filming in 2023 he ordered pizza and shouted everyone lunch.”
Away from set, Cheryl – who is an in-house lawyer for an agricultural business, juggles her day job and TV commitments with raising her family with engineer husband Jason, 46, who she met when they were both students at The University of Adelaide.
“He’s not really into trivia, so I’m not sure he understands the appeal,” Sydney-based Cheryl laughs.
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“But he’s very good at doing the cooking, picking up the kids and so on when I have to be in the studio. He’s always been very supportive.”
The protective mum is keen to keep her two kids out of the public eye, but says she lives up to her Tiger Mum persona in real life.
“A Tiger Mum is caring, strict and demonstrates a lot of tough love – quite big on discipline and structure. Good grades are the minimum but we also encourage them to excel in sports and music as much as they can. It’s just about ensuring they make the most of their opportunities,” says Cheryl, who admits her daughter “is really proud” of her appearance on the show.
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“It means a lot to her and to me that Asian Australian women are represented in the mainstream media because when I was growing up, I didn’t see anyone who looked like me on TV unless I watched a late night SBS movie,” she tells Woman’s Day.
“And so it’s meaningful for us to have some representation in a small way.”
And she’d be keen to be on our screens even more!
“Issa did spectacularly well on Dancing With The Stars. And apart from trivia, dancing is probably my favourite hobby – I do Zumba every week!”
