Cheryl began her exciting career in entertainment working for great mentors such as Garry Marshall, Grant Tinker, Brandon Tartikoff, and Peter Chernin. She opened her own casting company, Cheryl Bayer Casting, where she was known for finding talent for shows such as “In Living Color”, “Baywatch”, and “Dream On.” As the Head of Talent and Development at ABC Productions from 1990 to 1994, she worked in both comedy and drama development. During her tenure, Cheryl had a direct hand in marrying the writers and talent with shows such as, “Roseanne”, “My So-Called Life”, and “Home Improvement.” After joining Creative Artists Agency as a packaging agent, she developed new talent and created projects. While there she was an instrumental part in the success of shows such as “Sex and the City” and “Freaks and Geeks”. Moving to Fox as Senior Vice President of Comedy, she developed over fifty scripts and was directly responsible for the success of “Malcolm in the Middle”, “That 70’s Show” and “Family Guy.”
Leaving FOX to pursue her passion in Education, Cheryl founded a critically acclaimed and award-winning children’s business, Creative Space LLC. Creative Space was one of the first in Children’s Edutainment providing live events, preschool programming, summer day camp, and sleepaway camps. Cheryl then returned to producing with several projects including an award-winning civil rights documentary, “Booker’s Place,” the launching of the Google Play campaign, and the rebranding of Febreeze.
Additionally, she is responsible for launching ESPNW. Most recently, Cheryl co-produced “the Gaggle”, a sketch show based on a millennial dating book for ABC digital, “Modern Farmer” based on the magazine, “Awkward Family Photos” for USA, and “The Clapback” for WeTV. She also co-created and produced 20 episodes of a web series for Dreamworkstv “Cranky Carl.”
Excited about merging technology with entertainment and education, Cheryl co-founded Living Popups, LLC. Living Pop-ups is an augmented-reality platform and media company focused on interactive, episodic storytelling through the medium of AR. In 2018 Living Popups created “The Aug-Mentors,” a first of its kind original AR series that premiered at AWE and also created cutting edge characters for Charlie Fink’s book “Metaverse” that launched at CES. In 2019 “The Aug Mentors” returned for the premiere of Fink’s new book “Convergence” released at SXSW.
Living Popups is a leader in AR technology for education, tourism, and entertainment.
Cheryl set up an adult animated series using AR for Lionsgate and a kid’s animated series for Nickelodeon. She and Living Popups have sold two animated series which incorporate Augmented Reality. She is also producing three more that will be out to pitch in the upcoming season. One of these is Make Way For Jade, a coming-of-age story seen through the eyes of a thirteen-year-old, deaf gay Jamaican girl as she navigates teen experiences – growing pains, dreams, crushes. This show is unique in that it will not only feature AR but also ASL (The first animated show to do so!)
Living Popups has produced a library of Augmented Reality educational apps, starting with the first four books in the Boxcar Children series. Partnering with Albertwhitman, Living Popups is working with the Atlanta School Public School district and the Boys and Girls Club to distribute these apps in classrooms across the country. The Boxcar Children is in Spanish as well!
Living Popups has also published Animal Farm AR (Featuring the vocal talents of Bryan Cranston, Alfred Mollina, Spencer Garret, Laraine Newman, Hal Cruttenden, and Steven Webber) and Of Mice and Men (Eric McCormack from Will And Grace, LeVar Burton from Star Trek). Living Popups is currently producing AR apps for Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet featuring the voices of Tom Payne (The Walking Dead) Kate Walsh (Umbrella Academy) and Sacha Dhawan (The Great) both of which will be available this year!
Living Popups is partnering with Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis to create an immersive AR music experience for their new album, Just Listen.
Recently Living Popups was contracted to work with the Airforce to create an on-base app TakeFlight, a mobile and web app supporting the well-being of military families and their communities.
Cheryl Bayer is currently producing a litany of scripted programming featuring diverse representation including Keep This to Yourself ( a who done it mystery starring a gay teen), Ella and Marylin a limited series exploses friendship between Ella Fitzgerald and Marylin Monroe), F My Mother In Law (based on a book with script written by Marc Hyman of Meet the Fockers) and Jesus! (a satirical comedy whose cast is mainly Latinx), as well as What The Finance ( a weekly, half-hour series that’s a humorous look at the economy & people’s changing relationship to it). Her partnership with Macy Gray’s organization My Good is producing Good Grief a five-part social impact docu-series. She is also producing No Credit! a docuseries following different unique individuals in varying feilds that never got credit for some of their iconic work, this series has XR components.