Harrison Ford Thanks Tom Selleck for Turning Down Indiana Jones Role Over 4 Decades Ago

"Thank you, Tom, man. If you’re listening, thank you again," Harrison Ford said at the Taormina Film Festival on Sunday

Harrison Ford knows he owes one of his career-defining roles to Tom Selleck.

As Ford, 80, appeared alongside his Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny costars Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Mikkelsen at the Taormina Film Festival in Italy on Sunday, the actor recalled to Deadline that Steven Spielberg only cast him as Indiana Jones after Selleck, now 78, was forced to drop out of 1981's Raiders of the Lost Ark.

"How I got the job? Tom Selleck had the job, but he also incurred an obligation to do a television series and he was unable to get out of that contract," Ford said during a panel discussion, as he was asked how he came to play Indiana Jones. "I became the second choice, and I’m very grateful for Tom. Thank you, Tom, man. If you’re listening, thank you again."

Ford went on to describe how franchise creator George Lucas, whom he had already collaborated with on Star Wars, called him to tell him to read a script he was sending to Ford's home.

"He said ‘I want you to read it right away, I want you to read it in an hour.’ I sat down, I read it an an hour, and he said ‘I want you to go over to Steven Spielberg’s house and talk to him,' " the actor detailed. "I went to Steven Spielberg’s house, I had never met Steven Spielberg before. I guess about an hour later I had the job."

Related: Harrison Ford Grows Emotional as Indiana Jones Fan Thanks Him for the Franchise: 'Means the World to Me'

“There was a guy in the middle of the jungle with a whip and a leather jacket,” Ford said, when asked how he went about “finding” the Indiana Jones character for Raiders of the Lost Ark.

“Pretty hot out for a leather jacket, and a heavy felt hat, and he was an archeologist and he was a professor, and what more would you need to know as an actor?" he added. "This is a guy who carries a whip. You know what that means.”

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Selleck was forced to drop out of the first Indiana Jones movie after he committed to film Magnum P.I. instead. Lucas, 79, had said he was initially reluctant to cast Ford because he did not want to have a close actor collaborator on each of his movies in a vein similar to Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro's frequent team-ups, according to an Empire magazine oral history of the first movie's production.

Related: Harrison Ford Shares the Movie Line He Uses the Most in Real Life: 'Get Off My Plane!' (Exclusive)

"I doubted he'd go for a three-picture deal - he didn't want to on Star Wars," Lucas told the outlet in the oral history. "And we had three pictures. Steven said to try anyway. I went to Harrison and he read the script and said, 'Yeah, I'll do a three-picture deal. I'd love to.' "

Ford has since played Indiana Jones across five total films, culminating with the soon-to-be released Dial of the Destiny. In addition to Ford, Waller-Bridge and Mikkelsen, the new movie also stars Antonio Banderas John Rhys-Davies, Shaunette Renee Wilson, Thomas Kretschmann, Toby Jones, Boyd Holbrook, Oliver Richters and Ethann Isidore.

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny releases in theaters Friday.

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