Playboy Interview: Tom Selleck

It's one thing to call him the most popular male actor in America, as some in the publicity business have done. But People magazine raised the ante by calling him ''the Clark Gable of the Eighties,'' with ''the body of an N.F.L. linebacker and the head of a Viking sea lord.'' A Ladies' Home Journal reporter saw that and raised: ''I've interviewed Redford, Newman, Reynolds and Eastwood, and in terms of sheer physical impact, they don't even come close.'' But the man being burbled over hardly seems to be playing the game. ''I just happened to have had some luck with a TV series that hit,'' shrugs Tom Selleck. Then again, he may be playing the game exceedingly well.

Three years ago, no one knew Selleck's name. If he was recognized on the streets at all, it was as the guy on the Salem billboards. But that was before ''Magnum, P.I.,'' the television series that features a charmingly inept but always sincere private investigator named Thomas Magnum, hit the airwaves.

With its lush Hawaii scenery and lingering shots of Selleck's 6'4'', 200-pound physique, ''Magnum'' is a continuing hit as it enters its fourth season. In the process, Selleck has become TV's biggest star and has caused a revolution in a medium once criticized by bluenoses for its overemphasis on female sexuality: ''Having passed through the winter of the incredible hunk, when ripple TV replaced jiggle TV, it has finally occurred to me that nearly all of the chests being bared on prime-time television these days have hair on them,'' wrote one critic, while another termed Selleck the prototype of half a dozen other male leads on popular television series. It was that label--hunk, implying macho and brainless--that stuck, and Selleck was stuck with it.

After the initial success of the television show, he granted a slew of interviews and photo sessions and seemed to be everywhere. Selleck posters and T-shirts were the new rage (his participation was often unwitting; most merchandising was unauthorized). His appeal was broad. He seemed unthreatening to men--he was shy, self-effacing and always the kind of team player who would never steal your girl--while remaining a heartthrob to women. His audience obviously sensed something more behind the hunk façade.

He tried to close the door on all the attention when it became oppressive, but it served only to fuel the publicity machine. He was on the cover of magazines that had never interviewed him and in picture spreads he had never authorized. Although he was not averse to the company of beautiful women, there were no apparent skeletons in his closet, no scandals to be revealed. The portrait that emerged, reluctantly, seemed to be that of a nice, uncomplicated guy whose looks, manner and engaging personality had struck a popular nerve.

His background may have something to do with it; the Selleck profile fits the nice-guy image. He was born in 1945 in Detroit, where he lived until he was four and his family moved to Los Angeles. From the start, he was hopelessly all-American: Always a top athlete, he was a letter man in high school baseball and basketball. His family began in the middle class and moved into the upper middle class as his father rose in the real-estate business to his current position as vice-president at an L.A.-based firm. Tom's basketball skills earned him a scholarship to the University of Southern California; even at free-wheeling USC, to judge by the evidence, he rarely got in any kind of trouble. He earned a watch from his father for following a family tradition of abstaining from alcohol, cursing and tobacco until he was 21--there's not much to suggest that he made up for it after that age--and his major high-jinks took place when he was a member of a college fraternity.

During the Vietnam war, he enlisted in the National Guard so he could pursue his fledgling acting career instead of being shipped overseas. Although he never aspired to acting--he had hoped to play professional baseball instead--he stumbled into acting jobs, television commercials, soap operas (''The Young and the Restless'') and occasional TV series (several small roles in ''Bracken's World''). There were also a few small parts in such movies as ''Myra Breckinridge,'' for which he was chosen by Mae West, ''The Seven Minutes'' and ''Coma.'' Like many stars, he bridles today at the idea that he was an ''overnight success,'' pointing to the 14 years he spent as a featured player and model.

But in 1980, he burst into the limelight. After only a few guest parts in such TV series as ''The Rockford Files,'' he was suddenly offered parts as Indiana Jones in a George Lucas/Steven Spielberg film called ''Raiders of the Lost Ark,'' in a Blake Edwards film called ''Victor/Victoria'' and as the lead in a TV series to be called ''Magnum, P.I.'' Because he had signed a contract with Universal Pictures, producers of the pilot, he accepted the television offer. Since the success of ''Magnum,'' he has, of course, gone on to become one of Hollywood's most sought-after actors and has starred in two TV movies (''Divorce Wars: A Love Story'' and ''The Shadow Riders'') and two feature films (last year's ''High Road to China'' and his latest, ''Lassiter'').

Stars such as Dustin Hoffman, Robert Redford, Alan Alda and Al Pacino are certainly more respected actors, but Selleck is something else--a kind of hero for this time. Unlike Pacino's or Hoffman's, his good looks are less ethnic, more WASPy. And unlike Redford's and Alda's, his politics, which trickled out in bits and pieces of interviews, appear to be relatively conservative. He has seemed to support President Reagan, was supposedly against abortion and for nuclear power. Although he amplifies and even changes some of those political points in this interview, claiming that previous quotes had been taken out of context, they seem appropriate all the same: Selleck is a star for the Reagan era. He, like his character on ''Magnum,'' is patriotic and concerned and has an amiable sense of humor.

With all that attention being lavished on him--especially by the ladies--it made us curious: What does Tom Selleck have that a lot of the rest of us would like to have? To find out, Playboy sent David Sheff to Honolulu, where Selleck was beginning to shoot a new season of ''Magnum.'' Here is his report:

''Yes, he is good-looking; and on first impression, he seems a nice enough guy. But I wondered as we began, What is all this fuss about? Selleck fiercely defends his privacy, so most of our interview sessions took place in his mobile home, well stocked with cans of apple and grapefruit juice, a TV set and an electronic phone system. A couple of sessions took place in his office on the Universal Pictures lot. No press- or business-related meetings are held at his home; he reserves that for his own time.

'''I always try to be polite to fans,' he says, 'but I'm not polite to people who get near my home. I tell them they are on private property and if they do not leave, I will call the police.'

''The fan attention was, indeed, incredible. It was reminiscent of 'A Hard Day's Night'; girls actually seemed to palpitate when they saw him, struck speechless, stuttering or screaming. If there were a spare moment, he would give them a nod, but that would bring on more squeals. When he could, he posed for photographs with female fans. No matter where he went, they were there. On the set, they lined up five thick behind police barricades, waiting for a glimpse of him; as he passed by, the murmurs rose to shrieks and there was near pandemonium. Selleck seems to appreciate the importance of these fans at this time in his career, but the actual confrontations with them seem difficult for him; he has not yet adjusted to them.

''These interview sessions were different from others I've done with celebrated people because of Selleck's formidable schedule. Literally every 20 minutes, no matter the importance of the subject matter we were discussing, we would be interrupted by a knock on the trailer door and a voice calling, 'You're needed, Tom.' It was also a difficult interview because of the constant presence of a CBS publicist who monitored every conversation. Although he did not try to censor Selleck's responses--nor did he try to guide the questioning, for I would have stopped the interview--even Selleck seemed to realize that his presence was inhibiting. It reminded me of the policy of the old-time studios that tried to control their stars' public personas. Selleck apologized for it: 'Network policy,' he explained. 'They've been very good to me, so I try not to make any waves.'

''But he was obviously concerned that the interview represent his true beliefs about the variety of topics broached. He's had enough of the dumb-hunk, sex-symbol image, and he looked to this interview as a way to set the record straight. For the three days following our talks, my telephone rang as Tom called to clarify one point or another, to add another thought or two--particularly where political beliefs were concerned. And although he considered the serious subjects the most important, he realized he had to cover such requisite questions as 'What's it like to have women chasing after you all the time?'

''What I liked most about him was how truly embarrassed he was by all the adulation. Overall, he was more thoughtful than his image as a hunk had allowed, though being thoughtful doesn't necessarily mean being colorful or provocative. While insisting that his preferences in women were a private matter, he was frank in discussing how tough it can be for a sex symbol to get an interesting date. He also exhibited a tender side, speaking candidly about his former wife, Jacquelyn, and her son, Kevin, whom he treats as his own.

''But the pressures were getting to him, that much was clear. When he remarked wryly that his eyes were not blue but 'brown and red,' he wasn't just joking. He's being pulled in hundreds of directions, and his schedule is probably more demanding than this particular U.S. President's. It was on that note that we began the interview.''

[Q]Playboy: Your schedule, by almost any standard, seems impossibly busy. How are you keeping up with it?

[A]Selleck: Barely. I'm just trying to ensure that it doesn't get in the way of my acting. There's no time to study scripts or think about a performance. I have been running from one project to the next for what seems to be years. Since Magnum became a hit, I went straight through without pausing for a break from my first season to a TV movie, Divorce Wars, working about 14 hours a day; finished that about 10:30 on a Saturday night, then flew straight to Hawaii to start the second season of Magnum on Monday. I had planned a month off before going to Yugoslavia for High Road to China, but the series went about a month over, so I had five days to get from Hawaii to L.A.--where I did promotion for Divorce Wars. After High Road, at long last, I was supposed to have six weeks off before the next season of Magnum. High Road went way over schedule; and immediately after that, an old commitment came up--to work with some friends on a TV Western on location in Mexico; then it was back to L.A. for another week of High Road; straight back to Hawaii to start Magnum again; nine months of that; another film, Lassiter, in London; and now Magnum again.... Whew, this has turned into a long-winded explanation, hasn't it?

[Q]Playboy: And we were going to ask you what you do in your spare time. How has being in such demand affected your craft?

[A]Selleck: The point I was trying to make is that I don't have the time to work on parts the way I would like to. At a certain point, you think, Well, if I weren't quite so burned out, if I had some time to charge my batteries, I might be doing better work. My philosophy about all this attention--posing for pictures, signing autographs, doing interviews--is that it's great to have fans and I'll do everything I can for them, but never at the expense of what goes up on the screen. If I get so tired that I can't do as well in front of the cameras, it's all pointless. A long time ago, when I played sports in high school and college, I learned something that applies to this business, too: There are no excuses. You're judged on your performance. When an audience sees you up on the screen, it doesn't care, and it shouldn't care, whether you have the flu or you just got some bad news or you're in the middle of a divorce or you just drove your car off the roof of a building [grins slyly]--or anything. People just want to be entertained. So I'm not making excuses. I go into every new role really worried and scared. The first few days are very difficult. So I myself, though sometimes I wonder if I'm pushing too much--

[As if on cue, there is a knock on the door of Selleck's trailer and a voice calls out, ''They're ready for you in front of the camera.'' After working on a three-minute scene for 20 minutes, Selleck returns.]

[Q]Playboy: You were talking about pushing yourself too hard.

[A]Selleck: Yeah, I know pressure is part of the job, but I understand how people can fall into the trap of thinking they need something artificial to get them going. It's a huge trap people fall into--the feeling that you need drugs to keep your body going when you're on a schedule like this. I flat-out don't take drugs. But a real problem for me is the nature of the work, with this many nonstop commitments. An actor has to observe people, even when he's not doing it consciously. Actors are students of behavior. And if I'm around only film crews, TV crews and PR people all the time, I get an isolated, parochial idea of what's going on. Keeping in touch with ''normal'' people is very important--otherwise, you get smug. You think you know what's going on, but you don't. You lose your sense of judgment. I think it happens to a lot of actors when they get ''very hot.'' They lose contact with the real world.

[Q]Playboy: How do you fight that?

[A]Selleck: My big anchor has been my family. It's always there to put me in my place if I'm getting a bit full of myself. My best friends are my brothers and sister. The family is there, like a rock. There are a few other friends, but things have changed with my acquaintances. Some people I went to school with whom I haven't talked to since I went to college call me up and just want to say hi--and just happen to have a business proposition. I don't really consider them friends. So besides my family and a few close friends, it gets harder and harder to be with ''normal'' people; it just isn't quite the same thing when everybody recognizes you. You can't just go out.

[Q]Playboy: How has that affected you?

[A]Selleck: It's very hard. I like to spend time with myself, such as going down to the beach, sitting on a towel and reading a book. I can't do that now. But as much of a pain in the neck as it can be, I try to do it: I go to the beach, do my own shopping. The alternative is to shut yourself up in your house, your little fortress, but I don't think that's too healthy.

It's not just the loss of privacy that is dangerous. You also get all these perks when you're in my position. They're great, and you enjoy them so much you begin to expect them. People give me free things, send me stuff they'd like me to wear on the show.

[Q]Playboy: [Indicating a stack of shoe boxes in the corner] Such as those dozens of pairs of size 11-1/2s?

[A]Selleck: Yeah, but more than the gifts, it's the way you're treated. You go into a restaurant and you get the best table. Then you get to the point where if you walk into a restaurant and they treat you like a normal person, you're outraged. It becomes ''Don't you know who I am?'' It's nonsense, but it's there. I mean, I pose for so many pictures that one time, a man came up to me with a camera and said, ''Excuse me.'' I almost said, in a weary tone of voice, ''Sure, I'll take a picture with you and your girl.'' But before I could patronize him, he said, ''Could you please take a picture of us in front of that landmark over there?'' I had just assumed they had recognized me! It gets worse: When I was invited to the Kennedy Center, I was posing for pictures with the President and Mrs. Reagan. Dudley Moore and a governor were there, and after about eight pictures were taken, I realized I was standing next to Mrs. Reagan with my arm around her! I was so used to posing with fans that I did it subconsciously.

[Q]Playboy: At least you keep a sense of humor about all of it.

[A]Selleck: But the point is, I don't want the best table! And I don't know where in the rulebook it says that people's standards change with a ''public figure.'' I'd learned that it is rude to interrupt somebody's dinner, especially when he's in the middle of a bite. But people do that all the time. I don't yell at people who do that stuff, but sometimes, somebody asks me for an autograph when I'm eating and I say, ''No, but I'd be happy to if you'd wait until I'm through eating.'' Then he goes away and I feel guilty. I realize I'll never see this person again and that the ten seconds he spent with me is his impression of me for the rest of his life.

[Q]Playboy: Looking on the bright side, we imagine that you don't have much trouble getting a date these days.

[A]Selleck: It may be easier to date a groupie; it's a Lot harder to get a date with a woman I really find interesting. And I don't get specifically propositioned as much as people think. It might be refreshing if I did! [Laughs] Women think that I think--it gets complicated [laughs]--they're an easy mark for me because I'm on a television show. You get into this think-counterthink nonsense. Some women don't want to go out with me for dinner and end up in the gossip pages the next day. In general, I've found I have more to overcome with interesting women.

All of that attention has turned me into a very slow worker with women. I'm less apt to hop in the sack with someone--for a lot of reasons. I don't want to be Magnum in bed with somebody, I really don't. I don't think I can be that guy she has in her head. You're going to fail if you try to live up to that image. So, instead, you try to figure out where people are at.

[Q]Playboy: Are you pretty good at that?

[A]Selleck: No. I've gotten burned quite a bit. I'm not great at it, and I have more trepidations than ever. I realize there is a certain natural curiosity, but sometimes I feel like a mascot. I get asked to parties a lot. I don't really have much time for them, but when I did, I'd spend about two hours taking pictures with very sophisticated, often very wealthy people, and they'd have their kids there and I'd feel like a pet at the party. I find that's very insulting. It would be real nice to just go to a party and sit and talk with people. It can be the same thing with a woman who you finally figure out is mostly interested in being seen with you. For obvious reasons, you have a tendency to question people's motives--and most people do have a motive or an ax to grind, or they want something. On my bad days, when I'm not thinking quite right, I have the feeling that everybody is tugging on my sleeve and wanting something--but it's part of the job, as I say.

[Q]Playboy: It's tough being a sex symbol, eh?

[A]Selleck: Let's just say there are two sides to the coin. As Paul Newman once said when he was asked how he felt about all the women chasing him, ''Where were they when I needed them?'' I was always shy with women. When I was a teenager, there was an enormous preoccupation with girls; but I lost my virginity at a far more advanced age than my peer group.

If you keep a sense of humor about it, you realize that the attention has nothing to do with you. It's all image. I mean, it's flattering, it's nice to get the attention, and I'm as weak as the next guy about it. I've been at parties and met somebody who obviously wanted to meet me because of the image of the show, which can be a fine way to be introduced. But the extent to which we actually dated was in direct proportion to how fast that syndrome went away. If what you do for a living is the main thing, it gets old real fast.

[Q]Playboy: What does a sex symbol feel like?

[A]Selleck: The whole sex-symbol thing is absurd. It would be ridiculous if I started buying that stuff. And if macho and ''hunk'' and 32 other titles come with that of sex symbol, I don't want it at all. I have a hunch that the best directors in Hollywood don't want to work with a sex symbol. They want to work with a good actor. It's just another media hype. There is no event in which the hottest new sex symbol is picked. You don't get a degree in sex symbolism. I don't even see Magnum as a sex symbol. I think he is a well-rounded character. He screws up a lot. He's not always right. He doesn't always say the right thing to women and he doesn't always get the girl. So the sex-symbol thing is meant to sell magazines; next year, there will be a new ''hottest sex symbol.'' The healthiest way to operate is to treat all of this as a job. In the over-all scheme of things, it's not that important. I've said it before: I'm not curing cancer. I'm not really that important. Everybody talks in terms of his career. When I hear myself doing that, I try to correct myself and refer to it as a job. That's what it is. It's a fun job--on my good days, I feel like I'm stealing money--but that's what it is. The biggest help I've had in keeping this in perspective is the 13 or 14 years when I wasn't the hottest thing since sliced bread.

[Q]Playboy: What do you think of all the press coverage you've had these past couple of years?

[A]Selleck: I think some of the exposure is good. I just don't want people to get tired of me. It's been very frustrating trying to hold it down, especially when you very politely say no to people you think are ethical and they write about you anyway. Sometimes, the press can threaten you, which also amazes me: ''We're going to do an article anyway, so you may as well cooperate and give us an interview.''

[Q]Playboy: Do you succumb to those threats?

[A]Selleck: When you talk with attorneys, you realize you have absolutely no legal right to stop them; it's very frustrating. But you cannot give in to blackmail. The less scrupulous people in the business hide behind the First Amendment and ''the public's right to know.'' Those are just excuses for the press to exploit you because you happen to sell magazines at that particular time. There is a difference between reporting news and exploiting people. Immediately after my son and I had the accident [in which Selleck's car was driven off the third story of a parking garage], I called my press agent so she could get out the word that we were OK, so my family and friends wouldn't worry. A press release was put out that told about the accident and said that I was fine. But a friend heard a TV bulletin interrupting a program, saying--believe it or not--''Tom Selleck involved in accident. News at 11.'' That's all it said! It is completely irresponsible and exploitative--they knew by then that there was nothing to the story--and that was by the so-called legitimate press, not the National Enquirer.

It's a bit frightening. I believe strongly in a free press, and I think it's one of the great strengths of our system of Government. But with every freedom comes a responsibility. If you abuse the responsibility, you run the risk of losing the freedom. If you're willing to give up the responsibility, you'll probably lose the freedom. I worry about that. I worry about an overreaction to a small element of the press that is unethical and makes a bad environment for the rest of the press.

[Q]Playboy: An unauthorized biography of you was published. Did you have anything to do with that?

[A]Selleck: Absolutely not. It's quite bizarre to have someone you never met write your so-called life story. All of that was a shock to me. I felt a little raped one of the first times it happened. I've gotten thicker-skinned about it, but I don't like it. The fact that I could turn something down and people could still do it was a shock to me. And the fact that people could make up stories--literally make up lies and print them and get away with it--was a shock to me.

[Q]Playboy: All of that has a familiar ring to it. Isn't it just the price of celebrity?

[A]Selleck: Says who? In a sense, they're saying, ''Your only recourse is to sue,'' which isn't my favorite pastime. A lot of this does come with the territory, and my shoulders, have to be broad enough for it. But it doesn't affect just me--it affects my son, it affects my ex-wife, it affects my mother, my father, my brothers and my sister. It affected my grandmother until she died. When she was very ill in her hospital room, people showed her stories about me that were lies. It was upsetting for her.

[Q]Playboy: What sorts of stories are the most offensive?

[A]Selleck: I may be a bit unrealistic, but I don't feel it's anybody's business whom I date. The public may be interested in whom I date, but I don't think it has the right to know. I think that's my own business. There have been countless stories about people I supposedly dated--and sometimes we were a continent apart. When I was in Yugoslavia, I was supposedly having a mad affair with Victoria Principal, who was in Texas or California or somewhere. Linda Evans is an acquaintance, and we have mutual friends, and I like her very much--and suddenly, the press had us having a mad affair, because I joined a group she was with one night at a restaurant. I like her. I've met Victoria Principal, and she is very nice. I might be able to be friends with them. But I don't want them to think that I'm encouraging stories about them to get publicity; that gets in the way of friendships.

[Q]Playboy: With the success of your show, are you concerned that you'll be typecast as Magnum?

[A]Selleck: Of course it's a concern. It puts you into a box, and you're trapped there. My solution is to always surprise the audience a little bit. There are surprises in Magnum. And there were surprises in my character in High Road to China and there are some in my new picture, Lassiter. I don't think the audience is going to accept my doing character parts yet, but I would like to do them in the future. For now, I think all I can do is try to expand myself each time I do something--a little bit, within the framework of what I figure the audience is going to accept.

[Q]Playboy: Do you really think you've done that with your movie roles? Critics have suggested you've simply played different versions of Tom Selleck.

[A]Selleck: I think that if I'm doing my job right in a picture such as Lassiter, for instance, people are going to say, ''He's playing himself.'' In a way, that's a big compliment to me--I've made the roles believable. But in all the work I've done lately, from the series to the TV movies to Lassiter, I've considered my characters very different. To me, they're all a bit of a stretch, which is very important.

[Q]Playboy: We're not sure what you mean. Thomas Magnum and Patrick O'Malley in High Road, for example, are similar character types.

[A]Selleck: I agree that they aren't really different, but if I go 180 degrees away from how the audience thinks of me just to prove I can act, I'm not so sure they're going to accept it. But if I try to stretch a little bit here and a little bit there, gradually, I will be able to do drastically different roles. It was important to me that there not be any Magnumisms in my characters in the feature films.

In Lassiter, I play a thief, which posed an interesting acting problem: The way the film is structured, the audience has to like me, but I steal from people. I kind of wrestled with that for a while. I discovered that it's important for a character like that to have a code. It's not necessarily important that the audience know precisely what that code is, but it's important that he operate consistently, whatever his code may be--important that it's clear to the audience that he does operate from a set of values. Anyway, who knows what will happen? I'll let you know in about ten years whether or not it worked. I believe I can overcome typecasting.

[Q]Playboy: What is the difference between working in television and in movies?

[A]Selleck: The first thing I was aware of in the movies was that my eyeball was going to be ten feet tall. My mouth was going to be six feet wide. It's so much larger than life that it's a bit frightening. But movies and TV are largely the same techniques, the same cameras. The difference is the page count and the amount of time you spend on each scene. I have always felt that in either medium, an actor gets a lot more credit--or blame--than he deserves. Sometimes, you forget that a writer wrote the script. And film making is a collaborative effort. As self-centered as we want to get, we just can't make it alone in movies.

[Q]Playboy: Would you eventually prefer to do only films?

[A]Selleck: It's great being able to do both. There was a time, about five or six years ago, when if I had to leave a television series, nobody would touch me in a film. I think it's very positive and healthy that those barriers are breaking down. An actor should act. The problem was not the public but a prejudice within the industry. It's a myth that audiences won't pay to see you in a movie if they can see you for free on TV. The television market is a huge, world-wide one now. Magnum was in 50 countries after the first year and a half. High Road did the best in the countries that had broadcast Magnum, but five or six years ago, people would have considered that a curse.

[Q]Playboy: Do you admit that the biggest selling factor in High Road was Tom Selleck? The picture made money, but the reviews were mixed, at best.

[A]Selleck: Well, I think it was a good movie, but if people came to see me, that's great. I hope they keep coming, because I want to keep making movies. And I prefer calling them movies. I think we can really get full of ourselves when all of a sudden it's ''careers'' and ''films.''

[Q]Playboy: Didn't you almost become a movie star before becoming a TV star when George Lucas offered you Harrison Ford's role in Raiders of the Lost Ark?

[A]Selleck: Yes. I was also going to do Victor/Victoria, by Blake Edwards. Both would have been exciting projects, but when there were scheduling conflicts, I chose Magnum.

[Q]Playboy: Any regrets?

[A]Selleck: No. I can't imagine anybody doing a better job than Ford did. It's his movie, his accomplishment. It was offered to me, and I tested for it. I'd already done the pilot for Magnum, and when Lucas and Steven Spielberg offered me Raiders, CBS picked up my option for Magnum. The network tried to talk them into delaying it, but it didn't work. I have always felt a sense of accomplishment in that I tested for the part and got it.

I know it's easy for me to say now, since Magnum became such a hit. Raiders was such a successful film that had Magnum gone on the air and been canceled after four shows, I might have been depressed. Really depressed.

[Another knock. ''Rehearsals, Tom!'' After a half hour, the interview resumes.]

[Q]Playboy: You've been called the new Gable, the new Redford, the new Newman. Is that kind of PR hard to live up to?

[A]Selleck: If it comes from the PR people, I say, ''Forget it, guys.'' I just laugh. If a critic says it, I think all you can be is flattered by that stuff. There isn't going to be another Gable or Redford or Newman. To be mentioned in the same sentence is real flattering. I'm a big fan of all those people. The problem with buying any of that stuff yourself is that next year, they'll be calling somebody else the new Gable. If you really buy that, you've got a long way to fall when it changes--and it will change. Actors have a lot of hills and valleys in their careers, and I see no reason that I won't have a few more valleys in the future. I don't want to fall that far.

[Q]Playboy: Perhaps even more flattering, there has been a lot of publicity about actors who are ''new Sellecks.'' How do you feel about all your imitators?

[A]Selleck: Well, I guess it's flattering to be considered a prototype, or whatever it is, but I've seen a lot of the shows you're talking about. The actors they're calling Selleck clones may be doing shows that follow a certain trend in TV, but they are all unique; they are all good actors and they work very hard. You don't last very long in TV if you can't act. I just feel bad for the other actors--guys who have studied their craft. I don't think they want to hear that stuff. They should be able to celebrate their own success. It's their achievement; it has nothing to do with me. They are performing the best they know how. I'm sure it bugs them to be called a hunk or anybody's clone.

[Q]Playboy: Do you have any theories about the phenomenal success of Magnum?

[A]Selleck: I honestly don't. I did six other pilots that were never sold, and in some of them, I was as good an actor as I was when I did Magnum. I think a lot of it is timing, and a lot of it is script. A lot of reviews call Magnum an action/adventure show or a hunk show, but I don't think people who write those really watch it. To me, our show is about people. The interaction among the characters is everything. We don't have a car chase in every show. I don't shoot somebody in every show. What we always have is interaction among the characters, particularly the regulars. In fact, I like the little subplots that always work better than the main plot--the case that's being solved. Whatever it was, somehow we were lucky enough to catch an audience.

[Q]Playboy: Do you keep tabs on Magnum's competition?

[A]Selleck: No, I don't. I think all we can do is produce the best show possible. I don't have a lot of time to watch TV, which bothers me, because I want to keep my knowledge of the talent pool out there and a sense of the product that is being put out. When I have a chance to watch, I'll watch Magnum. I'm not one of those people who watch only educational TV and news and sports. I definitely like television. I just don't have much time. I used to really enjoy Harry-O and The Rockford Files. I'm a big James Garner fan. Oh, yeah, I love Hill Street Blues.

[Q]Playboy: Such as?

[A]Selleck: Every actor I know has the same cross to bear: When he walks into an office, there are certain stereotypes he has to overcome to get that job. If you're trying for a serious part and they know you from comedy, it's ''Oh, no; he's too funny.'' Someone may, at first glance, seem too tall for a part or have the wrong voice. If you walk in and they, know you're a former basketball player from USC who has done modeling, they say, ''Oh, here comes a big dummy.'' You're written off before you walk in. I did a lot of parts in commercials that were definitely first-impression parts. You walk into a room and they say, ''Well, he looks fine.'' But I had a problem when it got past that, to having to speak.

[Q]Playboy: Why?

[A]Selleck: When I was 25, I looked as if I were in my 30s, but I sounded about 12. But gradually, I got work. If you do a good job, people ask you back. Slowly--very slowly--you overcome whatever stereotype there was.

[Q]Playboy: Your complaint sounds like the male version of the dumb-blonde-actress stereotype.

[A]Selleck: Well, I think it's tougher on women. A lot of it is due to the fact that in our business, most of the people who give out the jobs are men. There's such a thing as chemistry. If a male producer finds an actress attractive, he's more likely to give her a job. But I've never had any kind of personal proposition from a man or a woman at an interview. Anyway, I think I'm being taken more seriously, so maybe I'm going in the right direction.

[Q]Playboy: One reason your show is taken seriously is the presence of the Vietnam legacy in your scripts--with three Vietnam vets as characters, Magnum is unique on TV.

[A]Selleck: We do get a lot of mail from veterans who are grateful for our show. They have seen Vietnam veterans depicted on television as maladjusted sex maniacs or psychotic killers suffering from delayed stress. They can't thank us enough for presenting an image that is relatively positive of three guys who served in Vietnam, who had different views about it and who emerged as relatively normal people who have made relatively normal lives for themselves. And that is the case with most of the people who served in Vietnam. But some of the shows I'm proudest of are the silliest ones. Of course, I lean that way anyway. I'd rather make a fool out of myself than anything else. We've done some very silly shows.

[Q]Playboy: How do you respond to the criticism of Magnum's violence?

[A]Selleck: Violence is one of the elements of drama, so a certain amount is necessary, particularly in a show with a detective plot. But Magnum isn't excessively violent. People who say it is don't watch the show. And I do worry about television's preoccupation with violence. One reaction to that concern has been to show the same amount of violence but less of its results: The camera will zoom onto the gun and you won't see the body. To me, that's worse. You should show the consequences. There certainly is gratuitous violence on television. If a show doesn't hold itself up, it has to rely on violence and car chases. You see cars crashing into one another all over the place. Again, you don't see the consequences. I've been in a car accident. It's not that much fun. So, yes, I am concerned about the image we portray. Kids, in particular, don't always separate reality from fiction. A letter from a kid saying, ''I love to see you drive fast in the Ferrari'' worries me.

[Q]Playboy: After a day on the set, do you get into a Ferrari?

[A]Selleck: I don't drive it. Ferrari has given me one to use, but it got impossible here--it was like driving a flag around. Too bad, because it's a wonderful car. Who wouldn't want to drive a Ferrari?

[Q]Playboy: In any case, is it hard not to be Magnum when you leave the set?

[A]Selleck: I know I'm not Magnum when I'm off the set. I'm reminded enough of my mortality: My knees hurt when I play sports and all sorts of things.

[Q]Playboy: Do you do any of your own stunts?

[A]Selleck: I do some, but I don't have a compulsion to do all my own stunts; I think it's unprofessional. If I get hurt, 150 people on the Magnum set are hung up. There are not many days they can shoot our show without me. If I'm working on a movie, it could be many more people and lots of money. For a while, I stopped everything--including sports, which have always been a part of my life. But I've managed to break my nose a couple of times since I've been here. I play competitive volleyball, which is a very fast game; the ball can be spiked at about 90 mph. I worked with a very dark spot on my nose for a while. I try to be professional, but you can carry that only so far.

The most unprofessional thing I ever did was this year, while I was working on Lassiter. I played on the Outrigger Canoe Club volleyball team and we made the championships, but I had to be in London when they were scheduled. By coincidence, I was asked to speak at Bob Hope's 80th birthday party at the Kennedy Center. I hate speaking publicly, but how do you say no to Hope and the President? Because of that, I was able to schedule time off from Lassiter, even though we had just started shooting that week. I got two days off. I asked for an extra day, claiming it was for rehearsal, then chartered a Learjet to take me back and forth between Washington and Memphis, where the volleyball championships were being held. I holed up with the team in a motel--two to a room--and we won the championships! I was like a kid, laughing over what I'd done. But winning that tournament was the biggest achievement of my life.

[Q]Playboy: That certainly doesn't rank up there with the worst crimes ever confessed. You mentioned earlier that you don't do drugs--

[A]Selleck: And I think it's important to say that in interviews. I've lost close friends to drugs. I don't want to sound puritanical, and I'm hardly a saint--I have my share of vices, but drugs aren't one of them.

[Q]Playboy: What are?

[A]Selleck: For starters, I no longer sneak around clotheslines and steal underwear. [Laughs] I don't know. I've been known to drink too much. But I don't enjoy getting drunk. I like some wine with dinner.

[Q]Playboy: OK. For the record, what is the story behind the headline-making accident involving you, your stepson and a parking garage?

[A]Selleck: Well, I had a few fender benders when my dad was teaching me how to drive. It was like that with my stepson, Kevin. I was teaching him how to drive a stick-shift car. He had a little problem with the clutch at just the right time: We happened to be on top of a three-story parking garage. We went over the edge and hit the ground. We walked away; we couldn't have been any luckier. But what was awful about it was that the poor kid made a small mistake and it was in the newspapers and they gave it to him at school. He's weathered all that--he has it in the right perspective, I think--but it's an example of what my family has to go through because of me. He is getting the brunt of my success without the perks.

[Q]Playboy: What is your relationship with him?

[A]Selleck: It's a heightened reality: dad for a month. But it's nice in that the time is about as normal as possible. I don't want to be Santa Claus for a month when I see him, though that's the tendency. I'm still dealing with the guilt that my marriage to his mother split up. But we manage to have some kind of normal life. At least we try. We went over to McDonald's the other night for some hamburgers, and I had to sit in the car and he had to get them for us. We sneak into movies after the lights go down. It's a little bizarre.

[Q]Playboy: During the split-up of your marriage, you were in Divorce Wars. Was that merely a coincidence?

[A]Selleck: Believe it or not, it was. But your personal life does affect your work in front of the camera. It was scary. The character was very different from me and he didn't handle the situation as I did, but I felt what he was going through.

[Q]Playboy: Did the split-up with your wife, Jacki, have anything to do with the pressure on you when Magnum took off?

[A]Selleck: Not at all. Perhaps there would have been trouble, because doing a television series is one of the worst strains on a relationship there can ever be, but the plain and simple fact is that the problem my wife and I had had come to a head six months before I ever did the pilot for Magnum. Of course, stories were written about my getting hot and dumping my wife. There were other mean stories that wife. There were other mean stories that spoke more derogatorily of my wife than of me. Maybe the writers figured she didn't have the resources to pursue them legally; I don't know. It really infuriated me. I asked for this. She didn't.

[Q]Playboy: Because of all that--and all the sex-symbol craziness we've talked about--would it be difficult for you to have a serious relationship with a woman now?

[A]Selleck: Yeah, and I worry about that. The nature of the work means there are long separations, which are hard enough. Then, when the articles start coming out about you and the leading lady becoming an item--and, no, I don't get involved with people I work with--it eventually has some effect. Also, I work so hard, I go home like a zombie sometimes. At some point, the woman would--and should--say, ''What about me? What about us?'' I've resigned myself to the fact that it would be very tough to have that now. Whatever happens, happens. But I really worry that someone may not even be getting a chance because of all this.

[Q]Playboy: You don't get involved with people you work with?

[A]Selleck: I think it's a big mistake. You can't control your emotions, but let's say you become infatuated with somebody you're going to be working with for the next four weeks. And you get involved. And something happens after the first week so you're not involved anymore. You have three weeks of hell in front of you. Especially if you are portraying lovers.

[Q]Playboy: Did you learn that from personal experience?

[Selleck smiles.]

Come on, 'fess up.

[A]Selleck: Sometimes you fail.

[Q]Playboy: Anyone we'd know?

[Selleck grins, points to sealed lips.]

Let's move on--or back. Did you grow up a fan of movies and television?

[A]Selleck: I was a bigger sports fan than anything, but I grew up on Jimmy Stewart, John Wayne, Henry Fonda, Gary Cooper; Wayne, particularly. I've always loved old movies. I've always watched a lot of movies on TV. I will stay up until three A.M. to watch a terrible horror film. It's got to be really bad, though.

[Q]Playboy: On your list of favorite leading ladies, is there one you would most want to work with?

[A]Selleck: The list is enormous. I hate to list them, because I'll leave somebody out. There's one: Audrey Hepburn. I'll leave it at that.

[Q]Playboy: When did you decide to go into acting?

[A]Selleck: At USC, I was in a fraternity--Animal House was a parody, but ours was sort of like that, a jock house. I certainly didn't want to be an actor. I never even thought of this business. I fantasized about playing professional baseball, especially when I was younger. When I got offered a contract at Fox, I was still at college and I'd never done any acting. But a friend of mine talked me into trying it. I took a drama class in college--because it was supposed to be an easy course--and the teacher said my friend and I were good types for commercials. My friend went out and found a photographer to take pictures and all that, so I sort of followed his lead. Then, without really trying, I got the same commercial agent. I went on a few interviews and never got anything except something in an Air Force training film.

Eventually, after my last season of basketball, I got a Pepsi commercial--not because I gave a brilliant reading but because I could stuff a basketball with either hand. About that time, I also went on The Dating Game a couple of times. I was bachelor number two--and, no, I wasn't picked. But somebody at Fox saw me on the show and called me to audition a scene. The studio put me under contract. I think I started out at $65 a week. That's when I took acting classes, voice classes--though nothing helped my voice--and dance class.

[Q]Playboy: So your first acting jobs were in television commercials?

[A]Selleck: Yeah, commercials were what kept me alive. I've always felt I'd rather do a silly commercial than take a silly acting part for the money. When I got more successful in commercials, it gave me the ability to turn down the acting parts I knew I shouldn't do. I had one job in the year and a half before I did the pilot for Magnum, by my own choice. I was even able to say no to Magnum when they first offered it to me, because I didn't feel it was right--it wasn't quite the same show it is now. It was more in the James Bond category, and that wasn't what I wanted to do.

[Q]Playboy: When did you begin acting in a series?

[A]Selleck: The commercials were in the early Seventies. I had already gotten some parts--one starring role and one lead in a pilot for a series. I also did a remake of The Best Years of Our Lives, in which I had one of the three leads. I had already done that stuff, and then I did a print commercial for Salem cigarettes and became known as the Salem Man. But I moved away from that, and for the next 12 years or so, I did dozens of soap operas, pilots and movies of the week until Magnum came along.

[Q]Playboy: Your college years were in the late Sixties. What was your situation with Vietnam and the draft?

[A]Selleck: Around the time I was in college and got that contract from Fox, I got called for my physical, which meant I was going to be drafted in about three months. I had a student deferment, and I was very concerned. I didn't particularly want to get shot at, but I firmly believed in my commitment, my military obligation.

It seemed as if the best way to fulfill my obligation and still work with Fox was to get into the National Guard. If I were drafted, I would have gone away for two or three years. By enlisting in the National Guard, I went on active duty for only six months of training and then served one weekend a month, plus two weeks in the summer, for six years. I was an Infantry soldier at the time things were getting a little dicey. Two days after I got back from active duty, we were activated to go to Vietnam. All of a sudden, after enlisting so I could stay in the States and work, I was in an Infantry unit that was going to Vietnam! Two days after that order came in, it was rescinded, but our unit was the first unit in the Guard, so every time anything happened--fires, floods--we were activated. I remember some terrible times when Bobby Kennedy was shot and we were sent to guard the armory in case something happened.

It was a very political time, and the rhetoric got turned into such nonsense. Every once in a while, somebody would find out I was in the National Guard and I'd get accusations like ''You're supporting killing.'' The National Guard was not the most popular place to be then. The scariest time for me was when we were called into the riots at Isla Vista near Santa Barbara. William Kunstler spoke to a mass rally. He gave a speech, getting people riled up. But when a riot broke out, he wasn't so courageous leaving right afterward. He was good at letting other people get arrested and leaving kids in volatile situations where they could be seriously hurt. I've never forgotten that.

I was stationed in front of the Bank of America, where the riot started. We had roadblocks throughout the town. I didn't want to be there. I did not like the idea of being stuck in an adversary situation against people I considered peers. Nobody did. That was about the time of Kent State, and we were all aware of the volatile situation we were in. After Kent State, we all asked, ''How can anybody possibly shoot anybody, especially unarmed kids?'' There's no answer to that question. But I got some insight into it in Isla Vista in the middle of one night. We didn't know what was going on--we were not adequately trained for the situation. I didn't want to hurt anybody. And somebody was going to get hurt; we were just waiting for something to happen.

We hadn't gotten much sleep in the past 24 hours, and we were going to be up all night at our post. We were given orders to lock and load when we saw a mass of people coming down the street toward us. I refused to load. I don't know why--it was as if I couldn't comprehend the seriousness of the situation. But the potential for tragedy was there. I remember one guy in charge of our unit panicked. That's why I can at least understand the climate in which Kent State occurred. We were there muttering jokes at one another, trying to laugh off the situation, praying somebody wouldn't throw a Molotov cocktail at us. We didn't want to admit that we were really in a life-threatening situation. We couldn't conceive of that. I'll tell you what finally ended the riot: It started to rain. By that time, the kids were giving us cookies and coffee. And the riots were over. The kids went back to their apartments and started throwing parties. But what I really resented was that I could have hurt somebody. And over what?

[Q]Playboy: Do you feel any more or less political today? In the coming election year, will you endorse a candidate?

[A]Selleck: I'm well read on politics and I really have very firm beliefs, but until now, I've been determined to keep them pretty much private. I'm not sure that it's fair for me to use my position as an actor to sway people. At the same time, I also feel my opinions should count less.

[Q]Playboy: But you have taken stands on such controversial issues as abortion and nuclear power.

[A]Selleck: No, not really. An article that came out recently summed up what I supposedly thought of the President, abortion and nuclear power in one paragraph. It was yes, no and maybe. That was taken from an interview I did in Yugoslavia, and the writer drew broad generalizations from some comments I made. And that was in another respected magazine.

[Q]Playboy: Set the record straight.

[A]Selleck: When I was asked whether or not I supported the President, it was right after Reagan had been inaugurated, and I said yes. It was his first year in office and he definitely had a mandate, yet I saw a tendency for people to second-guess his economic policies, which was absurd. All I said in that interview was, ''I think we ought to give his economic policies a chance.'' He'd been increasingly hamstrung by the system of checks and balances, which is fine, though I would have liked to see him have his way even more to find out whether or not his ideas worked. If we elect somebody, he's got to be able to implement his policies. It seems to me that economically, an awful lot of things he's done are working quite effectively; I'm saying that two years after that article. I thought it was a little unfair for somebody to quote me a year and a half later, but he did.

As for abortion, I never spoke out. All I said was that I didn't think it was just a woman's issue. When women's groups try to usurp a man's right to share in that decision, I disagree. It takes two people to conceive a child, and I believe the man ought to be included in the decision. That's all I said. The only thing beyond that I will say about abortion is that nobody has been able to figure out to my satisfaction when human life actually begins. That is the major problem in dealing with the abortion issue. Nobody knows at what point during the gestation period a fetus thinks and feels. I think those are important questions that have to he answered before you even deal with the subject. That's all I really care to say about it.

As far as nuclear power goes, I said, in effect, ''I think the jury is still out, but to my knowledge, no one has ever been killed in a nuclear-power accident.'' That doesn't mean we shouldn't have safeguards, but people often get killed in the utilization of other sources of power, so I think we ought to give nuclear power a chance and watch it closely. We obviously are watching it closely; it's almost impossible to build a nuclear-power plant now that there are so many constraints. Beyond that, I don't want to really get into all of those issues, mainly because I don't think I am prepared to talk about those complicated issues and take stands on them so cavalierly.

[Q]Playboy: Where do you stand on the political spectrum?

[A]Selleck: Oh, God, I don't want to get into all that. Yes, I have strong feelings about a lot of it, but I don't want to get that much into politics. I'd rather speak in general terms. I believe strongly in our free-market system, with its inherent rights--the right to better yourself, the right to fail. Unless you have the right to fail in a free society--without opting for cradle-to-grave security--you're never truly going to have the ability to succeed. What we have in this country is rare in the world. We have a place where you can be born poor and end up rich; we have that mobility. Now, it's very difficult, and the odds are certainly stacked against you if you are born poor, but I do know that we have upward mobility and, consequently, less of a class system than other countries. A lot of rich people pay very little in taxes and they are doing it quite legally. They are always going to have a certain advantage, because they can hire the best attorneys. That's just part of the human condition. There are always going to be those kinds of differences and inequities. You can't legislate them away. They certainly haven't in Russia. There, the only people who get limousines are bureaucrats and athletes. Or actors.

[Q]Playboy: So you don't think much of socialism?

[A]Selleck: I think that's a bunch of nonsense. Show me one society that's ever bought that scheme and has evolved past the dictatorship to the proletariat. I think people are realizing that there is no free lunch. If you want the Government to do something for you, you're going to have to pay for it, and you can probably get it done more efficiently and cheaper by paying for it yourself than by paying for it in taxes.

[Q]Playboy: You're more conservative, even right wing, than we expected.

[A]Selleck: No, I'm middle of the road. I think the far right and the far left converge in totalitarianism. Now, I'm very much against big business, but I'm also against big unions and Big Government. Power in that proportion corrupts itself. Every Government project and agency should be subject to review and renewal. Unfortunately, when we establish a commission or an agency to handle a problem that is legitimate and should be handled, people are hired and have jobs they then want to protect. But the function of that agency should be the elimination of the problem and, therefore, of the need for itself. Then you end up having people creating problems just to justify their salaries.... Boy, I've said an awful lot about my political feelings after telling you I didn't want to talk too much about them!

[Q]Playboy: Why did you decide to let loose now?

[A]Selleck: I've been quoted on all those things. I think that if my opinions are going to be quoted, they at least ought to be my opinions. This is by far the most I have ever spoken my mind about anything, and it's because I choose to do so, because of your format. I think it's the fairest format there is. I've always read the Playboy Interview--but I buy the magazine for the pictures. [Grins]

[Q]Playboy: All right, we can't finish this interview without asking a couple of final questions. First, is it true you make $7,000,000 for two seasons of Magnum?

[A]Selleck: I'm not getting paid $7,000,000 for two years. I'm making a lot of money--a lot more money than I ever thought I'd make. What I make is my business. I don't like leaking selective information about contracts and things like that. But, yes, I'm making a lot of money. I'm making investments for the future and some sort of a game plan so my family is taken care of. But these figures are mind-boggling to me. I mean, it's a cliché, but it's true: How much can you spend?

Somebody asked me in an interview if I feel guilty because I'm making a lot of money now. I said absolutely not. I don't go home and stick the money in a mattress; I invest it, I spend it and I go to better restaurants, and all those things create better jobs, and they are what our system--our free-market system, when it operates in the best and the purest way--is all about. What's the other question?

[Q]Playboy: An important one: How many Hawaiian shirts do you own?

[A]Selleck: I have bunches, but I haven't bought one in, oh, about four years. I really don't want to run around Honolulu in a red Ferrari and a Hawaiian shirt, trying to stay young.

[Q]Playboy: Do you think about getting older?

[A]Selleck: I think about it. Sure. At my age, it's quite easy to fractionalize your life. There are a lot of little landmarks you hit: 25 is half of 50; 38 is half of--what?--76. So I do wonder where I've been and what I'm doing. I ask, Am I going in the right direction? So I take stock a little bit, I guess. It doesn't do much good to worry about it, though. I mean, none of us is going to get out of here alive.

[Q]Playboy: With all the pressure and attention, you seem to be OK--pretty much in control.

[A]Selleck: On good days. On bad days, I lose everything. It's a hard image to live up to. In an interview like this, I want to speak what is in my heart of hearts, but I do censor myself. Sometimes, I tell you not necessarily what you want to hear but what I want you to hear. That's not to say it's not honest, but it's a heightened reality. I don't want the burden of being a sanctimonious all-American hero or sex symbol or anything else. I just do the best job I can. I fail to reach my standards most of the time. But I keep them; it's important to talk about standards and goals, but that's all they are--goals. I'd hate to be held accountable for not living up to everything I say. Somewhere between the standards and the striving for them, I'm doing pretty well and feeling very lucky about it.

''I don't want the burden of being a sanctimonious all-American hero. I fail to reach my standards most of the time.''