Sammy Hagar shared a video on his official X account, where he talked about his unusual first encounter with Jack Nicholson during a party following the release of ‘5150.’
Van Halen’s reputation for throwing wild parties during their heyday in the 1970s and 1980s is well-documented in various biographies and interviews with the band members. In one of these, Hagar met Nicholson, as he recalled:
“What are my favorite celebrity meetings was… Van Halen was doing, with the release of our first album, ‘5150,’ we had a big party in Hollywood. We invited all the cool people, and Jack Nicholson showed up. I’m a Jack Nicholson fan, and he is a funny character. He stands there with a big grin. I go right up to him and say, ‘Oh, Jack I love you.'”
The Comical Exchange With Jack Nicholson
The singer then revealed the actor’s reaction to him, explaining:
“He goes, ‘Hey, I love you too man.’ I go, ‘I watch all your movies.’ And he goes, ‘Yeah, yeah. I listen to all of your records.’ Everything I said to him, he just repeated back to me for about five minutes. Pretty soon, I got f*cking idiot. What do you say to a gut like Jack Nicholson?”
Hagar’s Reaction And Ongoing Interaction
Sammy added, disclosing how their communication continued for the rest of the night:
“I was like, ‘You are my hero.’ ‘Yeah, you’re my hero, too.’ It was the weirdest thing. I can’t say we became friends. He just stayed like that all night. He always had that big smile and grin. We were all doing funny stuff back then.”
The Surprising Encounter With Miles Davis
As a rock star, Hagar had the opportunity to cross paths with many notable figures in the entertainment industry. He frequently takes to his social media platforms to share stories about these encounters. In another account, the frontman recalled meeting the jazz icon Miles Davis in the oddest of circumstances, noting:
“I remember being in a doctor’s office in Malibu, and I walked in and Miles Davis is sitting there, all slumped down in a chair with a guy next to him; and a doctor walks out, tells the next patient to come in. [Then] He [the doctor] goes, ‘Oh Miles, have you met Sammy Hagar?'”
The former Van Halen singer continued, sharing Davis’ unexpected gesture:
“And he [Davis] goes, ‘How you doing, young man?’ And I reach down to shake his hand, and he holds onto my hand, and I’m going, ‘Whoa, whoa.’ I’m kind of like bending over. So, he has my hand and he grabs it from my other wrist with his other hand and he starts pulling himself up off the couch. I’m, like, a little awkward. He was a little… He really was towards the end of his life.”
In one of his other many encounters, Hagar mentioned the moment when he saw Rod Stewart and Britt Ekland at a concert. They looked like superstars, and he was too intimidated to approach them. Sammy and his drummer felt starstruck and didn’t want to be around Stewart, thinking he might ask them to do something for him.
You can listen to his meeting with Nicholson below.
This episode of Storytime with Sammy is all about an encounter with the one and only, Jack Nicholson 😎 pic.twitter.com/S5zxv8A9dU
— Sammy Hagar (@sammyhagar) November 3, 2023
