Paul Giamatti Says People Keep Telling Him Cher 'Really Needs to Talk to Me' and He Does Not Know Why

"I don't know what she could possibly want to talk to me about," Paul Giamatti said

Paul Giamatti is playing phone tag with the Goddess of Pop.

During his recent appearance on SiriusXM's The Howard Stern Show, host Howard Stern mentioned how Cher is major fan of Giamatti's. "She wants to speak to you and speak with you," Stern told the Academy Award-nominated actor, 56.

"She does that to me. Every now and then I get a message from somebody that says Cher — not just that she wants to talk to me — she really needs to talk to me," Giamatti admitted. "Like it's important — like it's crucial that she talks to me."

By Giamatti's own admission, a broken line of communication between himself and Cher, 77, has been going on for some time now and it remains unclear what Cher would like to speak with him about.

"I'm like, 'What the f---? Why does Cher want to talk to me?' Nobody will tell me, and then I never hear anything," he told Stern. "And then a year will go by and it happens again."

Giamatti previously referenced this back-and-forth with Cher while he spoke about his podcast Chinwag during a November appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. At the time, he referenced Cher's repeated desires to speak with him "two times in the past couple of years" and expressed that he wants to host her on the podcast.

While speaking with Stern, Giamatti said a producer for his podcast did suc -

‘Really Blessed’ (Exclusive): Claire Kit,...

cessfully get in contact with Cher and that she left him a bewildering voic. "All she said was, 'I hear you want to talk to me.' That was it. That's all she said," he said. "So I left her a message and said, 'That's great, I'd love to talk to you, but I thought you wanted to talk to me.' And that's the last I heard, I haven't heard anything again."

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

While it is unclear what inspired Cher to first attempt to connect with Giamatti, the music icon did share a post on X back in March 2022 indicating she had been watching the actor's 2008 HBO miniseries John Adams, in which he portrayed the title character and second U.S. president. Giamatti won an Emmy Award in 2008 for that role.

" 'JOHN ADAMS.' PAUL GIAMATTI,& LAURA LINNEY’S WORK 'TRULY OSCAR WORTHY,' " Cher wrote on X at the time.

On Giamatti's end, the actor told Stern he still does not understand what Cher would like to speak with him about.

"I have no f------ idea, I don't know what she could possibly want to talk to me about," Giamatti said Wednesday. "And it's killing me, I'm dying to know what she wants to talk to me about. I mean, it would be great! I'd love to talk to her about anything. I don't care, it'd be fantastic."

Amazon’s Most Popular Fashion Finds This,...