TV personality Matt Gibb opened up on the “earth-shattering” experience of losing his father to an aggressive form of cancer just before Covid hit.
TV personality Matt Gibb opened up on the “earth-shattering” experience of losing his father to an aggressive form of cancer just before Covid hit.
With a new season of Celebrity Treasure Island going to air next week, 18 different charities stand to win $100,000 as celebrities battle it out on their behalf on the reality show.
Each celebrity has chosen to represent a particular charity in Te Waipounamu, and each will have their reasons for it. But for TV personality Matt Gibb, there’s a raw personal story behind his decision to support the Cancer Society.
In an interview on Newstalk ZB’s Real Life with John Cowan on Sunday night, Gibb opened up on the “earth-shattering” experience of losing his father to an aggressive form of cancer just before Covid hit.
“At the end of 2019, we got the phone call that no one wants to get – I was working in Sydney at the time, and got a phone call saying Dad had a lump on his neck. I flew home straight away,” he said.
“They did a biopsy and it came back as a really rare, really aggressive form of skin cancer: merkel cell carcinoma. It wasn’t a great prognosis. He went through surgery and then radiation and chemo, but in February 2020 he passed away. Cancer got him.”
Gibb describes the experience as “earth-shattering”.
“I was really close to Dad. He was such an amazing presence in my life – just nothing but love. He was the most warm and open person, a fantastic role model. I loved him to bits,” he told Cowan.
“It was heartbreaking. It was the first big loss in my life… so it hit me like an absolute ton of bricks. It was an incredibly grounding experience all round. It shook me to my core and made me look at life in a completely different way. It became a lot more real.”
Matt Gibb's heavy experience is what has prompted him to choose to support the Cancer Society in the upcoming season of Celebrity Treasure Island.
Gibb went back to Australia after his father’s funeral but, being early 2020, Covid made landfall – and a week after returning to the office, he found himself forced to work from home.
It was a “pretty tough year”, he says, as he processed the loss of his Dad in isolation, thousands of kilometres away from his grieving mother.
“There are a few charities that I’ve been close to over the years that are deserving of support, but now’s the right time to throw any support I can towards the Cancer Society and the work that they do across the country.
“They’re helping families going through what I know is the worst possible journey that you can go through as a family.”
Throughout his career, Gibb has largely had a full-time job, but in recent years he’s worked as a freelancer, picking up short-term TV contracts where he can. In that time, he’s hosted Country House Hunters and done some work for Breakfast, which he says have been amazing projects.
Matt Gibb doing the live weather cross for Breakfast, in one of his many roles. Photo / Ben Fraser
But at times, the lack of a consistent gig has taken its toll.
“There are patches now where I’ll be sitting alone in my apartment on K Road, making toast in the morning and looking at a day ahead of me with not much on, going ‘What am I doing with my life? Where am I?’
“You talk about self-worth coming from your job, and I’ve really felt that over the last couple of years when I’m not working. It’s incredible what your brain can tell you about how terrible you are at your career.”
In recent years he has been comforted, though, by the ways his job as an interviewer and host for TV programmes makes him feel close to his late father.
“Dad was a photographer for about 30 years, and so when I think about what his job was, it was almost exactly the same [as mine].
“People would come to his studio or he would go to their wedding, and he would make them feel at ease and try to project them in the best possible light. That’s kind of what I get to do for a job too.”
Real Life is a weekly interview show where John Cowan speaks with prominent guests about their life, upbringing, and the way they see the world. Tune in Sundays from 7:30pm on Newstalk ZB.
