At the Sundance Film Festival, the film Waitress will premiere this afternoon. Written and directed by Adrienne Shelly. Last November, Shelly had been waiting to hear whether her film was going to be accepted by the Sundance Film Festival when she was found dead in a the Greenwich Village apartment building she had an office in. Initially, police suspected Shelly killed herself, since her body was found hanging from shower rod, but her family and friends couldn't believe she would commit suicide with so much happening in her life. It turned out she had been killed and her body was staged to look like suicide; the suspect, a construction worker who admitted he got into a fight with Shelly when she complained about the noise he was making.
On Friday, the NY Times' David Carr had a feature about the film's upcoming Sundance premiere and spoke with Shelly's colleagues, like Waitress star Keri Russell and Hal Hartley, who directed Shelly in Trust and The Unbelievable Truth. Waitress producer Michael Roiff said, "It is unbelievable to me that I am in Park City, and she is not. She so much wanted this film to get in here, to be seen, and that’s why all of us knew that there was no way that she committed suicide. This movie is a huge turning point in her career.” The Salt Lake Tribune also spoke to Roiff, who added, "This is such a bittersweet time. I miss her. But I spend most of my time dwelling on how lucky I was to work with Adrienne. She made the film that she dreamt of."
Still from Waitress of Shelly (left), Cheryl Hines and Keri Russell
