With his chiseled good looks and brawny physique, Tom Selleck doesn’t seem 75, yet he’ll turn that age on January 29. Maybe the key to his youthful appearance lies in the fact that he was a late bloomer. “I didn’t really have success until I was 35, which was Magnum, P.I.” in 1980, he told Parade. And he admits he didn’t feel fully grown-up until much later.

“That was when my dad died in 2001,” Tom, whose father was a real-estate executive (his mother, Martha, passed away in 2017), once revealed to GQ. “I went, ‘There’s nobody to go to for fatherly advice. You’re on your own, pal.’”

Still, Tom had a solid foundation growing up in Southern California. “I had a great dad and mom, and I could go into analysis for 20 years and not blame them for anything,” he once said. “So I’m very fortunate that way.”

Tom Selleck in 'Magnum, P.I.'
Moviestore/Shutterstock

He’s poured some of what he learned into the character of Frank Reagan, the police-commissioner father of a law-enforcement family on CBS’ Blue Bloods, which is still going strong in its 10th season. “There aren’t a lot of examples of patriarchs trying to do the right thing on TV,” he told Parade. “That performs a certain function; fathers are important.”

Even as he’s become one of America’s most enduring and beloved TV stars, Tom’s managed to keep it all in perspective. “As good as this business has been to me,” he revealed to Beliefnet, “life is about more important things.”

First and foremost is his family. He’s been married to wife Jillie since 1987, and the couple have one daughter, Hannah, 31. “I have a wonderful wife, and our love has gotten deeper,” he gushed to GQ. “It just grows more satisfying. You become true partners.”

While Hannah is an adult (she breeds horses on a farm), “you never stop being a dad even though your kids are grown,” Tom noted to Parade. As an insider tells Closer Weekly in the magazine’s latest issue, on newsstands now, “he’s close and a good dad. Tom rides horses and spends time with her. She’s a lovely young lady.”

Tom’s loved ones will be on the very short guest list for his birthday party. “He feels he’s at a point where he just wants his family and close friends around,” the insider says. “He’s a low-key kind of guy.”

Tom Selleck With Wife Jillieand Daughter Hannah
Jim Smeal/BEI/Shutterstock

Blue Bloods shoots on location in New York City, and Tom lives in Southern California. Since it’s an ensemble show and he’s not in every scene, he’s able to fly back and forth and balance work and family time. This arrangement has lasted for a decade, and it’s not likely to change anytime soon. “If the show is still doing well and the net- work supports it, Tom will stay on it as long as it’s on the air,” says the insider.

Lately, Tom has also been writing his autobiography and, as he looks back over his life, he can be proud of the way he’s conducted himself. “People say, ‘I don’t want to have any regrets,’ and I don’t have,” he stated to GQ. “I’ve had bad breaks, and it was pretty tough getting to a level where I actually made a living in this business.”

That’s only made him appreciate success more, though he values deeper things. “Fame is a vapor; popularity is an accident; money takes wing,” Tom explained to GQ. “The only thing that endures is character.” And he’s still working to improve his own. “Few of us are as good as we think we are,” he says. “None of us are as good as we can be.”

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