After performing his own cinematic stunts for more than 50 years, Tom Selleck admits to “mess up” his health.
In the entertainment industry, Tom Selleck has had a long and distinguished career. The Magnum, P.I., and Blue Bloods star is still enthusiastic about his profession, and the next season of the popular drama series will premiere shortly.
Over the years, Selleck has taken on a variety of challenging projects. However, the 77-year-old is known for pulling off his own stunts, which has unluckily come back to haunt him.
When he was younger, Tom Selleck didn’t know exactly he wanted to be an actor. His family relocated to California, where he grew up in the San Fernando Valley, after he was born on January 29, 1945, in Detroit, Michigan.
Early life of Tom Selleck
In his dreams, Selleck attended the University of Southern California (USC), but his family was unable to pay the fees.
He received his diploma from Grant High School in 1962. He made the financial decision to live at home with his parents after starting studying at Los Angeles Valley College.
Early on, it seemed more possible that Tom would pursue an athletic career, rather than an acting one. He had aspirations of being a professional basketball player as he matured.
In light of this, one can only speculate as to how thrilled he was to receive a basketball scholarship from the University of Southern California.
“I never did school plays. I had no interest,” Tom declared in 2015.
But it was harder said than done to play basketball at a high level. He only managed to score four points in seven games for the USC Trojans in the 1965–1966 season. He failed to register a point in three games the following season.
According to a section of USC’s school handbook, Tom was an “agile and quick performer who adds depth on front line. Business administration major is good jumper with fine mobility. Rapidly improving shooter has impressed coaches with his hustle in practice. Needs to work on defense.”
In the end, though, Tom was unable to match his larger, taller teammates.
“I was pretty good, but I wasn’t good enough,” Selleck recalled.
Beginning of Tom Selleck’s acting career
Selleck was aware that basketball was probably not going to be his future profession. He did, however, have a backup strategy and got a part-time job to help pay for his school. The aspiring student first got a few jobs acting in TV commercials and made an appearance on The Dating Game.
Although it wasn’t his proudest moment in perspective, it had a greater impact on this future than he could have ever expected.
He characterized his experience on the dating program as being “humiliating and embarrassing.” “I lost. Twice. I wasn’t really amusing or funny.”
Selleck, however, soon received an opportunity to join 20th Century Fox’s talent pool. After two years of skill-building, he took a break to complete six months of military service.
When Selleck came back, he was fired. But rather than quitting, he was sure he would succeed as an actor.
He was cast in lesser roles in several television programs in the early 1970s. Selleck then appeared in six television pilots as he was getting close to middle age. Despite this, his major breakthrough missed him.
Tom claims that’s why many people believed he was an overnight hit when he was cast as Thomas Magnum in Magnum, P.I.
Making progress with “Magnum P. I”
In fact, he had worked and fought fiercely.
“The luckiest thing that happened was that I didn’t get a real job until I was 35,” Selleck said.
“When I was 25, I looked 35 but sounded 15. There are a lot of very good actors who make it as younger leading men but don’t graduate — because the audience won’t accept them as grown up.”
Magnum, P. I experienced great success. Tom became an overnight sensation thanks to the 1980–1988 criminal drama television series. Five years in a row, he was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series; he eventually won it in 1984.
Selleck had been trying to succeed as an actor for more than ten years and was on the verge of quitting.
“I think if Magnum hadn’t worked out, I’d never have worked again in this business,” he admitted.
Through Magnum, Tom gained cult status, and his career has been nothing less than an amazing success story ever since.
Additional credits include roles in movies like In & Out and Three Men and a Baby. When he began appearing as Richard Burke, Monica Geller’s older lover, in Season 2 of the popular comedy series Friends, he was also exposed to a new group of admirers.
A fresh and exciting chapter for Selleck’s career began in 2010 when he was cast as Frank Reagan in the television series Blue Bloods. The show’s 13th season, which will debut this autumn, has officially been confirmed.
Tom Selleck’s back problems
Selleck is estimated to have a net worth of around $45 million.
In several movies and television shows, actors have their own stunt double. For a tiny number, letting someone else carry out their stunts is just out of the question, even if it is sometimes a risky profession.
In the past, Selleck has performed the majority of his stunts personally, but doing so comes at a cost. He claims that his physique is not what it once was.
“My back’s kind of messed up,” Selleck disclosed.
When you do stunts in movies—I do a lot of them—you’re taking a risk, but you’re also sitting around a lot. So you might do a fight scene, and then you sit in your chair, and it’s not like you have a personal trainer saying, “Okay, we’re ready to go, but Tom needs ten minutes of stretching and warm-up.”
“And I think the price,” he added, “I see it with peers, I talk to them sometimes. You just see the price of all those stunts. They weren’t that hard, but I think it’s the stop-and-go of all that stuff.”
Although Selleck previously admitted he doesn’t enjoy going to the gym, he does his best to stay in shape by working on the family ranch in Ventura, California.
“I have a 63-acre ranch, and I do not all, but a lot of, the grunt work. Clearing brush, planting trees. We’ve got about a hundred ancient oaks I planted. I’ve probably planted a thousand trees myself.”
Tom Selleck’s spouse, marriage, and daughter Hannah
It should go without saying that Tom has a successful career. His devotion to Jillie Mack, his wife, is also something to be honored. While many famous marriages end, the couple has remained blissfully married for 35 years.
Selleck recalls meeting Jillie Mack for the first time during a performance of the musical Cats, in which Mack was starring. It was the 1980’s a fter Selleck’s ten-year marriage with model Jacqueline Ray came to an end.
Although Selleck claims he isn’t as slick with women as his on-screen roles, he did approach his future wife in the backstage, even though she made the first move.
“She had to go on [stage]. I was hemming and hawing, and she finally asked, ‘Do you want to meet for a cocktail?’” Selleck remembers.
The date ends up going well because Selleck and Mack were married in a small ceremony in 1987, shortly after. Their daughter Hannah was born a year after their wedding.
Since then, Selleck has prioritized his family over fame and made an effort to keep his private life out of the media limelight.
“I quit Magnum to have a family”
In order to make sure he had enough time to spend with his wife and cherished daughter, he even let his acting career to take the back seat.
“It took a long time to get off the train, but I try very hard to have balance, and this ranch has helped me do that.”
“We both thought it was the best environment for Hannah to grow up”, Jillie adds.
Tom was eager to share his love for the outdoors and the natural world with his daughter. It was quickly handed on to her by him!
Hannah was raised on the 65-acre ranch owned by Tom and his wife Jillie near Ventura. Horses are a shared love between father and daughter, and the two eventually started a side business breeding horses. Hannah continued her career as a professional rider, and boy did she succeed.
She has won a number of medals and qualified for several grand prix-level contests throughout the years.
At the 2015 Longines Masters of Los Angeles, Hannah Selleck placed in the top five in St. Moritz, Switzerland, Belgium, the Netherlands, and the Canadian Pacific Grand Prix.
A love of horses
Unfortunately, Selleck suffered a 2018 incident in which her tibia and fibula were broken. She was informed that she might not even be able to run again as a result, but fortunately, that was not the case.
Later, she turned her love of horses into the wildly prosperous breeding and training business called Descanso Farm. She and her father Tom are hoping to be able to maintain their love of horses for a very long time.
We will always hold a particular place in our hearts for Tom Selleck, and we wish him and his family many years of good health and happiness.
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