Shelley Duvall may have left the Hollywood spotlight behind decades ago, but her life at home was filled with love thanks to her longtime partner, Dan Gilroy.
Gilroy confirmed “The Shining” star’s death on July 11 at age 75 in a phone call with NBC News.
Gilroy, 77, said Duvall, who retired from acting in 2002 only to pop onscreen again in 2023’s “The Forest Hills,” had been in hospice care for several months. She died shortly after midnight at the couple's home in Blanco, Texas.
“She’s gone after much suffering, which I guess is a good thing, which after 34 years … I can’t tell you how much I miss her,” said Gilroy.
Duvall met the musician just before filming the 1990 Disney movie “Mother Goose Rock ‘n’ Rhyme.” The couple soon began dating and remained together for the next 34 years, with Gilroy supporting Duvall during her publicized struggle with mental illness.
Read on to learn more about Duvall's partner, Dan Gilroy.
Gilroy was Madonna's bandmate in Breakfast Club
Gilroy and his brother, Ed Gilroy, formed the band Breakfast Club in the late 1970s.
Dan Gilroy initially sang while his brother played guitar in the band, which also included by a pre-fame Madonna on drums. The future Material Girl left the band early on to start singing in her own band before pursuing fame as a solo artist, according to Rolling Stone.
Breakfast Club went on to release a self-titled album in early 1987, preceded by the Top 40 hit “Right on Track.”
The same year, the band scored a hit single with “Right on Track," which peaked at No. 7 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
Gilroy and Madonna briefly dated
Gilroy and Madonna met at a party in New York City in 1979 and went on to date while the two were in Breakfast Club together, the "Borderline" singer told Rolling Stone in 1984.
In fact, Gilroy got Madonna started on writing music.
“He stuck a guitar in my hand and tuned it to an open chord so that I could strum,” she told the publication. “That really clicked something off in my brain.”
“It was one of the happiest times of my life. I really felt loved. Sometimes I’d write sad songs and he’d sit there and cry. Very sweet," she added.
Their relationship was the focus of the 2019 docu-drama "Madonna and the Breakfast Club."
Duvall and Gilroy met in 1989
Duvall met Gilroy in 1989 as she was gearing up to film the 1990 Disney TV musical “Mother Goose Rock ‘n’ Rhyme," the actor told the Los Angeles Times in 1991.
Duvall, who starred as Little Bo Peep, also worked behind-the-scenes as a producer on the movie, whose all-star cast included Cyndi Lauper, Woody Harrelson, Little Richard, Terri Garr and Deborah Harry.
After meeting Gilroy, Duvall ended up casting the musician as Gordon Goose, a leading role.
The couple lived together in Blanco, Texas
After leaving Los Angeles in 1994 following an earthquake that damaged her home, the couple returned to Duvall's native Texas, where they shared a one-story house in Blanco, The New York Times reported in a profile of Duvall published in April 2024.
“It’s a little oasis for us,” Gilroy said of the couple's home.
The Times described the home as being strewn with Gilroy's paintings while "old framed photographs of Mr. Gilroy and Ms. Duvall smiling affectionately at each other glint on the mantel above the stone fireplace."
Gilroy addressed Duvall's mental health challengesGilroy opened up to the Times about Duvall's well-publicized struggle with mental illness, which made headlines after she was interviewed in a distressed state on a controversial 2016 episode of "Dr. Phil."
“It was great, all those years in L.A., really terrific,” said Gilroy. “And when we moved, after the earthquake, it was terrific in Texas. Things went downhill when she started becoming afraid of things, maybe didn’t want to work. It’s really hard to pin it on any one thing.”
Gilroy also told the publication he had no idea that Duvall had agreed to be interviewed on "Dr. Phil" and only learned about it after the fact from "people in town."
“It did nothing for her,” he said of the episode, which many critics deemed exploitative. “It just put her on the map as an oddity.”
