David Walliams was left mortified after approaching Cher while she was dining at a restaurant.
The Little Britain star and former Britain’s Got Talent judge was out for dinner with Jennifer Aniston, Adam Sandler and Luke Evans, who has just released a tell-all memoir, when the encounter occurred.
At the time, the stars were shooting the 2019 Netflix film Murder Mystery in Lake Como, Italy and were eating at a restaurant that is regularly frequented by Hollywood stars.
On this particular occasion, Cher was at the same place and, after spotting her, Aniston called the “Believe” singer and Oscar-winning actor of films including Moonstruck and Mermaids over to their table.
But later in the evening, Walliams got a chance to speak to Cher personally as he knew the friend that she was dining with – but was left red-faced by the star’s baffling response to him.
Writing in the memoir Boy from the Valleys: An Unexpected Journey, Welsh actor Evans (Clash of the Ttans, Dracula Untold) said: “I was chatting to Jennifer when something over my shoulder caught her attention. ‘Oh my God,’ she said, ‘is that Cher?’ She started waving. ‘Cher! Cher!’ My eyes went wide. Did she just say Cher?”
He continued: “Moments later this iconic figure in sunglasses and a cowboy hat appeared at our table. The sheer Cher-ness of her was just dazzling. Jennifer had known her for years because she had gone to school with Cher’s son, Chaz Bono, so she introduced us.
“As I shook her hand, it struck me that we had two Oscar winners and two of the biggest movie stars in the world in this one tiny restaurant.”
According to Evans, “David went over to talk to the woman Cher was dining with, mentioning that he was a close friend of Elton John and David Furnish”.
When her companion said: “Did you hear that, Cher? David knows Elton really well,” the singer “put down her cutlery, looked up” and simply replied: “Thank you very much.”
This prompted a mortified Walliams to retreat to his table to tell Evans, Aniston and Sandler what had just gone down.
“When he came back to the table and told us the story we were all in hysterics,” Evans wrote.
“I have no idea what she thought David had said – or even if she had bothered to listen to him – but she clearly couldn’t have given a s*** if he’d known the Queen of Sheba.
He added: “I love it when a celebrity turns out to be just as you’d expected, and for me that moment was pure, 100 per cent Cher.”
Boy from the Valleys: An Unexpected Journey is out now.
