David Cassidy’s Lifelong Friend Shares His Favorite Memories (Including That Crazy Monkey Story)
Superstar David Cassidy would have turned 75 on April 12, 2025. His long-time best friend was Sam Hyman, who turns 75 on May 24: the two had a best friendship that lasted for more than five decades. Here we talk to Hyman, who shares some of their most amazing moments together to honor and celebrate his ‘brother-from-another-mother’ since 1963.
Remembering a Little Monkey Business…
Everett Collection
When David Cassidy and Sam Hyman first moved out to Laurel Canyon together in 1970, their neighbor had a pet monkey, Rosita, who enjoyed swinging from the trees.
“One afternoon, David and I were having a beer outside, and David called Rosita over and asked her if she wanted some,” Hyman explains. “She took the can and, I’ll never forget it — she held it with her two little hands, and her foot would raise the back of the can so she could drink it. And she wouldn’t give it back!”
When the monkey tried to swing again, she wasn’t quite as nimble, bumping into branches and they soon realized feeding alcohol to a primate wasn’t the wisest thing to do. “But boy was it funny. If we were smoking at the time, we probably would have trained her how to roll!” he laughs adding, “Rosita did go on to live a long time.”
The Magical Moment of First Hearing That Song…
Credit: Everett Collection
Later that same year, both were cruising up Santa Monica’s Pacific Coast Highway in Sam’s convertible blasting the radio. All of the sudden: “Da da da da da da da da da” comes on. The song was “I Think I Love You;” it was the first time either one of them had heard it on the radio.
“The look on David’s face; he was astonished…we both were in shock,” Hyman reveals. “We looked at each other and David blurts out ‘Oh my !@#$ing God!’ and he starts singing with it! I gave him a look like ‘you’re in the big time now; you finally made it!’ We knew we had just experienced something very special; he went from strumming his guitar in his bedroom to actually being played on the radio! It was a very special moment for the both of us.”
Turning Pain into Glory…
A year and a half into The Partridge Family, the hit show was forced into a hiatus due to David’s ongoing abdomen problems, which led to gallbladder surgery. “David had to stay in the hospital and I wanted to cheer him up but I wasn’t gonna bring him flowers or candy or anything!” he laughs.
So, Sam and their mutual buddy, Al Rhoads, packed up their dogs into Sam’s VW and drove to the hospital. They found David’s nurse and she arranged for David to meet them at the door to the exterior steps on the floor he was staying on. “We snuck Ricky and Sheesh up about six flights of those exterior hospital stairs,” Hyman recalls laughing.
“I remember the door opening, the nurse peeked out and there’s David wearing his hospital gown with his rear sticking out the back, but he was so elated to see those crazy dogs!” he recounts with glee. “Ricky was so excited he almost ripped David’s stitches out because he couldn’t stop jumping all over him. Oh, seeing the joy that brought David! Just pure love in those five or ten minutes the nurse allowed,” then adds, “Man, you can’t get away with doing stuff like that anymore!”
Cherished Forever…
Hyman’s most endearing memory took place in 1993 on Broadway, during a Blood Brothers performance. The live stage production starred David and his famous younger half-brother Shaun Cassidy (their father was the actor Jack Cassidy), along with established actress Petula Clark, who played their mother.
“I’ve been moved by live performances before, like Michael Crawford‘s Phantom of the Opera but nothing like the way I was during David’s astounding Blood Brothers performance. I said to myself, ‘My God, he can really act!’ I think it touched me so much because of the brotherly connection David and I had and maintained through it all. I was crying. Even backstage afterwards with all those people milling around, I was crying.”