The Hollywood star Tom Selleck has revealed in his new memoir “You Never Know” that he once used his own money to give the crew of Magnum P.I. bonuses for $1,000 after the studio refused to do so during contract negotiations for the CBS series’ eighth and final season.
Selleck’s Magnum P.I. Crew
Variety reported that Selleck played the title role in Magnum P.I. for 162 episodes from 1980 until he decided to end the show in 1988. When it came to the eighth and final season of the show, Selleck admitted in his book that he considered not doing it because he “didn’t want anyone to think that last season was just a ploy to get more money.”
Selleck went on to recall asking the studio to give the crew $1,000 bonuses as long as the eighth season of the show came in under budget. He claimed that the studio “responded that they could not under any circumstances talk about crew bonuses, that it would set a dangerous precedent.”
“They always invoked precedent when you had an original thought beyond their contractual boilerplate,” Selleck explained. “Honestly, that pissed me off.”
Related: Tom Selleck Begs CBS To Save ‘Blue Bloods’ From Cancellation – ‘We’re Winning Our Night’
Selleck Fires Back
Selleck was so angered by this that he decided to take matters into his own hands, so he found a loophole to get his crew the bonuses that he felt they deserved by convincing the studio to give him a “substantial” personal bonus for the final season of Magnum P.I. He even brought in both his agent and his personal lawyer to make sure that this deal was just right so that he could give each member of the crew $1,000.
Selleck wrote that he told his agent and lawyer to instruct the studio “to issue thousand-dollar checks to every regular member of our Magnum company in both Hawaii and L.A.”
The crew was incredibly touched by this gesture from Selleck, and he’s never forgotten their response.
“When the checks came out, I got a picture from our L.A. crew standing on a bleacher with big smiles on their faces,” he wrote. “In front of them was a very big oversized check for a thousand dollars. The caption below read, ‘Thanks, Tom. What a ‘grand’ gesture.’ That made me happy.”
Watch Selleck talk more about his memoir in the video below.
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Selleck Chooses Family Over Magnum P.I.
Though Magnum P.I. was still at the height of its popularity when it went off the air in 1988, Selleck decided that the show should end so that he could spend more time with his family on their California ranch.
“I’m a fairly private person,” Selleck previously told People Magazine. “And I’ve always treasured the balance between work and time with my family. It’s always about them.”
Selleck is still a working actor to this day, as he has been starring in the CBS show “Blue Bloods” since 2010. This show is sadly set to come to an end this year, with the final eight episodes scheduled to air in the fall. Selleck has been trying to save the show from cancellation for the sake of his cast and crew, but so far, his efforts have fallen on deaf ears.
Selleck’s story about what he did for the Magnum P.I. crew shows once again what a class act he really is. If only there were more stars in Hollywood like him!
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Credit: Original article published here.