Husband of Adrienne Shelly Confronts the Man Who Murdered Her and Framed Her Death as a Suicide

Suspicious Murder of a Hollywood Director

Adrienne Shelly, ‘Waitress’ director, had been murdered back on November 1 in 2006. Her career had been on an upward trajectory when her life had suddenly been taken away from her and her family. A tragedy that had hit family, friends, and fans all alike.

In a documentary called “Adrienne”, Shelly’s life and her murder are explored in more detail. Shelly had only been 40-years-old when she had been killed just months before her movie “Waitress” debuted. Waitress was a rom-com starring Keri Russel as a woman who had sought out escaping an abusive husband and bakes her way into a better life. She had directed and also starred in the movie. Since the movie came out, it has been praised as being ahead of its time and being the premise of a popular Broadway musical, as well as earning Shelly an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best Screenplay.

The documentary dedicated to Shelly premiered on December 1, and it focused on Shelly’s life, death, and her legacy as a Hollywood star that was just beginning to hit her stride. In the film, we learn that Shelly had been born as Adrienne Levine in Queens, New York through her starring roles in the cult classics “Trust” and “The Unbelievable Truth”. As Shelly’s career had continued forward, she took on roles for off-Broadway productions and TV shows, as well as being a guest-star in Homicide: Life on the Street, Early Edition, Oz, and Law & Order.

During her time starring and guest-starring in shows, Shelly had found herself with an interest to get behind the camera. Her first time behind the camera had her directing Roger Rees and Time Guinee in a 1996 film titled Sudden Manhattan, and she had also directed Ally Sheedy in 1999’s I’ll Take You There. 

When Shelly had been discovered dead the day after Halloween, her husband had found her hanging by a bedsheet tied into a noose from a shower curtain rail in the West Village, Manhattan apartment that she had been using as her office. Her death had been ruled to be a suicide by the police, but Shelly’s husband, Andy Ostroy, insisted that Shelly was not suicidal and would not of left their two-year-old daughter without a mother. As well as this, Ostroy claims that in the final days of her life, Shelly had been nothing but radiant with happiness for one of the first times since her childhood, which he credited to their daughter. Ostroy stayed fixed on his disbelief that she would’ve left the world in this way, urging for detectives to investigate the death as a murder. It soon came out that Ostroy had been correct, and that Shelly had been murdered.

19-year-old Diego Pillco had been the one responsible for Shelly’s death. At the time, Pillco had been helping renovate another apartment located in the building when he had broken into Shelly’s apartment to murder her. He admitted to her murder in February of 2008, and that he killed her after she had threatened to call the cops on him after catching him stealing money from her purse. Pillco received 25 years without parole after pleading guilty to the murder for the lesser charge of first-degree manslaughter. 

Following the arrest of Pillco, Ostroy had visited the prison and confronted Pillco while he was behind the bars. As they spoke to each other, Pillco and Ostroy used a Spanish translator to make it easier. Pillco had informed Ostroy that he had needed money, and when Shelly had started yelling at him, the only word that he heard her say was the word police. 

Pillco, during his conversation, admitted to having strangled Shelly until her lips had turned blue, and that after she had passed away, Pillco had attempted to make the murder look like a suicide instead. Pillco also admitted that he had thought that he would get away with the murder, telling Ostroy that he was sorry after being shown photos of Shelly and Ostroy’s daughter.

Ostroy is now assisting in creating the film Adrienne with his daughter, who had been 2-years-old at the time of her mother’s death. Ostroy has intimate narrative-speaking due to his life living with Shelly, along with home video, archival footage, and anecdotal interviews from those who had grown up around her knew her and loved her. Due to all of these aspects that had gone into creating the film, Adrienne turned out to be an extremely powerful and emotional look at Shelly’s life, with it being clear that the woman had a real passion for creating art, with aspirations that had helped to uplift others. The film also explored the family that she had to, unfortunately, leave behind, with the career success that she had always dreamed of sadly coming after her death.

Shelly and Ostroy’s daughter is now 17-years-old. Upon speaking with the father and daughter, they were able to express the void that they felt in their lives and the struggle to find the closure that they desperately needed after Shelly’s death. Ostroy himself says that he had never met anyone like her, even 15 years after her death. Even years later, he still struggles to describe what he had first noticed about her and why she had caught her eye. All he knew was that she was a sweet little Jewish girl from Long Island. The film takes the opportunity to explore the far-reaching effects of a tragedy on a family and the community of the deceased. 

Even following Shelly’s death, her star continued to shine, bringing awareness to the talent and beauty that she was able to bring onto the sets that she worked on. In 2009, Magnolia Pictures had released the Meg Ryan-Timothy Hutton rom-com titled Serious Moonlight, which had been inspired by and directed by Cheryl Hines using a script that Shelly had written. In 2016, Broadway continued to honor Shelly’s name through marquees with the opening of the musical adaptation of Waitress, Sara Bareilles had her music and lyrics featured in it. The musical version of the movie ran for four years and had nearly 1,500 performances in the Brooks Atkinson Theatre.