It doesn't take Magnum P.I. to figure out why Tom Selleck has come back to television.
"No. 1, this show was good," the mustached actor says. "No. 2, it was an ensemble that was clearly going to require talented actors. Having done a lead, as I did in 'Magnum,' I was in every shot. I'm not complaining, but it's a tough road."
The 65-year-old Selleck is happy to be the first among equals in the new CBS series "Blue Bloods," playing New York City police commissioner Frank Reagan. Reagan can't help bringing his work home with him: His two sons (Donnie Wahlberg and Will Estes) are beat cops and his daughter (Bridget Moynahan) is a prosecutor.
Selleck would be delighted to see "Blue Bloods" match the run of "Magnum, P.I.," which ran from 1980 to 1988 — and, he is quick to add, ended at his request, not that of a waning audience.
"'Magnum' was never canceled," the actor says. "I left after eight years because I was tired from it, not tired of it. So, to come back to TV, it had to be the perfect fit.
"Once I found that fit, I knew I'd be glad to be back."
"Blue Bloods" has emerged as one of the season's few early hits, despite airing on Friday night, not usually a promising slot for a show. Selleck says, however, that the schedule never really worried him.
"My thing with TV is that, if it's good, the audience will probably watch," Selleck says during a telephone interview. "I remember doing interviews a long time ago for 'Magnum' when it started, and I got the same question about who would watch, because Thursday nights were one of the lowest viewing nights of the week when that show started. That was a good lesson for me. So, with this show, I knew it was kind of out of my hands anyway.
"I'm just delighted to be on the air."
He's also delighted to be playing Reagan, a far more complicated character than Thomas Magnum.
"He is the commissioner and came up through the ranks and was a beat cop," the actor says. "As a matter of leadership, he prefers to wear his chief's uniform, because he takes his job and the law seriously, which I appreciate. Magnum was laid back, and this character is different. I'm actually still finding out a lot about this character."
It's the family angle that produces such richness of character, he says.
"They're a family with conflicts," Selleck says, "and conflicts are interesting for me. You can't be more conflicted than the police commissioner who has a prosecuting attorney for a daughter and two sons who are cops on the street. From a command standpoint, that was a big help to me, in terms of the conflicts for this guy and the pressures of being in command when his family is out on the streets. There is a perception that he's either being too hard on his kids or they're getting special treatment.
"All of that will be useful as the show goes on."
"Blue Bloods'" New York will be instantly recognizable to New Yorkers, because the show films in the city, rather than resorting to cheaper locations in Toronto or other cities. Selleck spent years filming "Magnum, P.I." in Hawaii and lives in Los Angeles, but he had no problem with embracing a bicoastal lifestyle.
"New York was essential for me," Selleck says. "At first I heard, 'Well, maybe we'll shoot it somewhere else.' I said, 'Look, it's difficult for me to argue that a show about New York won't be better shot in New York.' No offense, Toronto, because I've shot there and it's a lovely place, but it's a different feeling. You wouldn't have shot 'Magnum' anywhere else but Hawaii."
Thus Selleck will, for the foreseeable future, split his time between New York and Los Angeles, where he lives on a ranch with his wife and daughter.
"I think I'll probably spend about half my time in New York City," he says, "but I don't mind the commute. I love my ranch and that lifestyle, but I also love to work and to really dig deep into a script.
"And I have a mortgage, so it all works out really well!"
It has all worked out well for Selleck, despite the fact that he hasn't achieved his first career goal, which was to become an architect.
"I guess it comes down to fate," he says, "because, when I had to sign up for my architecture core classes, they were all filled up. Not knowing what to do, I took the only class that was wide open. It was acting."
The Detroit native took to it readily. He made his first television appearance as a college senior on "The Dating Game" (1967), and did well enough to be asked back for a second time.
"The best part of it was that I lost both times," Selleck says with a laugh. "Maybe that was a good thing."
He became a household name when he was cast as the perennially tan private eye Thomas Magnum, and parlayed his television success into a solid-if-unsensational big-screen career. His biggest hit was the comedy "3 Men and a Baby" (1987), and he also did memorable turns in "3 Men and a Little Lady" (1990), "Quigley Down Under" (1990), "Mr. Baseball" (1992), "In & Out" (1997), "The Love Letter" (1999) and "Killers" (2010).
His biggest role, however, was one that he turned down: His shooting schedule for "Magnum, P.I." forced him to decline an offer from George Lucas and Steven Spielberg to play Indiana Jones.
If he ever had any bitterness from seeing that part go to Harrison Ford, Selleck says, it's long gone.
"You look at a long career and realize that certain things were meant to be ... and some were not," the actor says. "I don't look back with any regrets. I did the best things offered to me and created roles when I wanted to go that route."
Instead he mixed big-screen roles with occasional television work — most notably in a recurring role as Richard Burke, the suave doctor who romanced Monica (Courteney Cox) on "Friends" (1996-2000), as the replacement star of "Las Vegas" (2007-2008) and as the star of a series of CBS television movies based on Robert B. Parker's detective character Jesse Stone. The seventh in that series, "Jesse Stone: Innocents Lost," is due in 2011.
Selleck is quick to reassure fans of the Stone movies that "Blue Bloods" won't keep him from further work on the series, of which he is obviously proud.
"When a TV network buys a feature film in theaters, it plays just fine," Selleck says. "I wanted to do something that looked like a feature film. I don't think there's enough character-driven stuff on TV. This is about a watchable guy who is a mess. The audience sees that he's a decent guy and they root for him."
If he was going to do "Blue Bloods," the actor adds, it had to leave him room for more of Jesse Stone.
"I made it clear that I wasn't going to give up Jesse," he says. "It wasn't long ago that I was sent a note saying that 'No Remorse' (2010) was No. 2 in video sales, right behind 'Clash of the Titans' (2010), which was the big movie video of that month.
"I don't see any conflict in the two guys because they're so different," Selleck adds, "but it's my job to make these two characters different enough so the audience enjoys both. What we've become with Jesse, I'm grateful to say, is kind of a two-hour event, and I hope people want to keep watching him, because I love playing that guy."
At home in Los Angeles, Selleck lives with Jillie Mack, his wife of 23 years, and their daughter, Hannah, who is an international show jumper. The life seems to agree with him, because the casual observer would think that he hadn't aged at all since his 1980s prime as Thomas Magnum.
"I do age," the actor says with a laugh, "and I know, because I'm looking in the mirror. Plus it's hard getting up some mornings.
"The trap in this business is if you try to be who you were 20 years ago," Selleck says more seriously. "You have to be who you are right now."
Cindy Pearlman is a Chicago-based freelance writer.