There’s something different about Tom Selleck these days, and it’s not just the charming goatee he’s added to his trademark mustache. With Blue Bloods having wrapped up after 14 seasons, the handsome and always likable 6-foot-4 actor jokes that he is “unemployed,” but the 79-year-old has no plans to retire. He just doesn’t know what his next project will be.
“I wouldn’t say [offers] are pouring in, but maybe some people are thinking of me.”
The Detroit-born, Los Angeles-raised Selleck wouldn’t mind if one of those people was Taylor Sheridan, especially if the Yellowstone creator has a cowboy role up his sleeve for the star of six Westerns, including Quigley Down Under and Shadow Riders.
“A good Western’s always on my list,” he says. “I miss that; I want to sit on a horse again.”
Selleck’s love of the country lifestyle is a big part of why he lives on a 65-acre ranch. It used to be a working avocado ranch, but the California drought decimated its trees.
“We have a little avocado harvest every year,” he says of the ranch, which he shares with his wife of 37 years, Jillie Mack, 66, and their daughter Hannah, 35, who is the owner of a boutique equestrian breeding and training operation.
Acting was an “accidental” career for Selleck, who fell into the business. His dream was to be a professional baseball player, but when he took a theater class at Los Angeles Valley College for an easy A so he could transfer to USC, he ended up on a different path. Selleck acted steadily through the ‘70s but he didn’t make it “big” until 1980, when he was cast as Magnum P.I.’s Thomas Magnum, the role that made him a household name. The long-running role of Frank Reagan on Blue Bloods only added to that fame.
“I don’t know where my next job will take me,” Selleck says. “People ask, ‘What do you want to do next?’ I’m not sure. I don’t want to do Frank Reagan II.”
For this week’s Parade cover story, Selleck reflects on his legendary past—especially the years spent on Blue Bloods—and his bright future.
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Paulette Cohn: You commuted to New York to film Blue Bloods every two weeks for 15 years. What’s it like to not be working?
The hardest part for me is we had the Blue Bloods family and we had the actors’ family. They’re all my pals. I miss them. It’s going to take a lot of getting used to.
There’s talk of a spinoff. What do you think that might look like and would you be interested in being a part of it?
I’m open to suggestions because I love Frank Reagan, but nobody’s really asked. I don’t see him retiring and going off somewhere. If he goes off to a small town, I’d rather do more Jesse Stone movies.
