Who Is Cheryl Burke's Husband, Matthew Lawrence?
He was a child star, just like his brother Joey Lawrence.
Kathy Hutchins / Shutterstock The new season of Dancing With The Stars kicks on in September and we have the rundown of pros so we know who to cheer for. Past winner Cheryl Burke will be taking to the stage and she has a built-in cheering section: her husband of one year, Matthew Lawrence.
This won't be the first season that Burke has had Lawrence in her camp for the dancing competition but this will be the first time Burke has to live away from her hubby for the duration of filming. ABC has announced that it's taking special steps to keep everyone on the show healthy and that includes keeping the pros away from anyone who might have COVID-19. The couple has been in quarantine together since earlier this year so the start of filming will be a big change for the newlyweds.
Who is Cheryl Burke's husband Matthew, Lawrence?
Matthew Lawrence has been in Hollywood for decades.
If the name Matthew Lawrence is ringing a bell for you, it should be. Lawrence has been acting professionally since he was just a kid. He was born in Pennsylvania in 1980. He started taking music and dance lessons in NYC when he was as young as three years old and his mother took him commercial auditions alongside his older brother, Joey Lawrence. He started booking gigs when he was only four years old. That led to his first TV role on Dynasty in 1984.
Lawrence has been in some major titles.
From the time he was very little, Lawrence worked steadily in TV and movies. He did guest parts on Gimme A Break in 1986 and scored a role in the movies Planes, Trains, and Automobiles opposite Steve Martin and John Candy. He was one of the kids in the Robin Williams hit Mrs. Doubtfire in 1993 and did guest spots on his brother's sitcom Blossom. Later, he would have a starring role in the iconic 90s show Boy Meets World. His most recently acting gigs have been a yet-unreleased thriller called The Dead of Night and a film called Kurt which was filming this year.
His brothers Joey Lawrence and Andrew Lawrence are also actors.
It's not a coincidence that he shares the same last name as actors Joey Lawrence and Andrew Lawrence. The three stars are brothers, with Joey being the oldest, Matthew in the middle and Andrew is the baby of the family. Joey skyrocketed to fame on Blossom and later parlayed that into a project called Brotherly Love with his two little brothers in 1995. Matthew and Joey have often shown up in each other's shows: Matthew did a part on Melissa and Joey and both boys had been on Gimme a Break. The three of them also have a band called Still Three.
Lawrence dated Cheryl Burke in 2006 but they broke up.
Not all couples have a straight line from dating to marriage and that was definitely the case for Burke and Lawrence. The pair met in 2006, thanks to Joey Lawrence who had been on Dancing With The Stars. He introduced Burke to his brother and they dated for about a year before going their separate ways. It was a decade later that Burke's sister stepped in and convinced her to text her old flame and see what was up. She didn't expect anything to come of the random text conversation but once they reconnected, they realized the time was right to start dating again. They got engaged in 2018 and had their wedding a year later in San Diego.
Burke and Lawrence at their 2019 wedding.
Quarantine has given Matt Lawrence a chance to spend some quality time ... with his lizards.
While Burke and Lawrence are still basically newlyweds, he also has eyes for some of the other loves of his life: the cold-blooded variety. Apparently, Lawrence is a reptile enthusiast and has been raising iguanas and tortoises for over 25 years. In fact, his wife got him a custom cake that looked startlingly like a real iguana for his birthday earlier this year.
He has a whole menagerie of the animals in his yard and he's used the downtime during quarantine to highlight his passion for his pets. You can catch him on Instagram doing live Mr. Reptile Man videos where he shows off his garden and his menagerie.
The couple with an iguana cake in 2020.
Matthew Lawrence has also been bonding with his wife, not just his iguanas.
Larence and Burke have been in isolation together in Los Angeles, which was not how they planned to spend their spring. Burke was supposed to be on a Dancing With The Stars tour in the Bahamas and they were going to turn that into their first-anniversary celebration as well. Instead, they were stuck at home, but not even their real home. They were planning to move before the tour started and that got put on hold due to the pandemic restrictions as well. But they have been enjoying married life and Burke says she has a real sense of "ease and peace now that I am married."
The pair has said they definitely want kids sometime in the future but there haven't been any baby announcements yet. Maybe that will be their next project after DWTS Season 29 and Mr. Reptile Man.
Rebekah Kuschmider has been writing about celebrities, pop culture, entertainment, and politics since 2010. She is the creator of the blog FeminXer and she is a cohost of the weekly podcast The More Perfect Union.