Tom Selleck Is Ready For Prime Time

Emmy Award-winning actor Tom Selleck returns to CBS prime time this Sunday night, in "Jesse Stone: Death in Paradise." It's the third movie in a series based on the best-selling books by Robert B. Parker.

Selleck is back in his role as a hard-working police chief in a small New England town and, visiting The Early Show, he told co-anchor Hannah Storm he loves the character and is pleased that the series has struck a chord with viewers.

"The fact that we've done so well with the other two, and they like this thing, I'm thrilled because I'd like to do about 40 of them," he said.

In "Jesse Stone: Death in Paradise," Selleck investigates the murder of a teenage girl and becomes somewhat obsessed with the case. "What makes him maybe not too healthy emotionally sometimes is what makes him a good cop," Selleck said. "He gets much too involved in his cases, particularly cares about kids. He kind of falls in love with a girl found floating in a lake three weeks after she died. He can't even recognize her. He kind of falls in love with who she was — and, in some naive way, I think he thinks if he catches the person who did it he can bring her back to life."

Selleck is himself the father of a teenage girl, Hannah, and is enjoying some of the challenges of parenting. "I'm very proud of her," Selleck said. "She rides horses competitively and jumps about five-foot fences — which will give you a heart attack as a parent. But she's really good and gifted and a good kid." The thing about teenagers is, "They want to do stuff that you don't think they should do."

Selleck is 61 now, but says he refuses to get caught up in worrying about age. "Numbers are numbers," he said. "Since I play an age range and not just one age, it's probably better to be known age-wise as somewhere between Brad Pitt and death. But I don't worry about that stuff. I got fortunate. I think it amounts to being comfortable in your own skin. I also don't think you should try and look like you did 20 years ago. It's the beginning of the end. You are who you are, and people either like it or they don't."

"Jesse Stone: Death in Paradise" airs Sunday night at 9 p.m. ET/PT on CBS.