Killer Thriller: A Small-Town Cheerleader Murder That Became the Highest Rated TV Movie of 1994 with Kellie Martin.
misSPELLING
iHeartPodcasts
4.3 • 824 Ratings
🗓️ 22 February 2026
⏱️ 51 minutes
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Summary
Kellie Martin joins Killer Thriller to revisit the true story behind Death of a Cheerleader, the 90s TV movie based on the real-life murder of young girl in a small affluent town. The movie became the highest rated TV movie of the year.
At just 17, Kellie stepped into the role of Angela Delvecchio, the girl who killed her classmate. She reveals why she avoided researching the real case, how she fought to make Angela sympathetic instead of monstrous, and why she saw shame and desperation at the heart of the stabbing.
Kellie opens up about feeling like the outsider next to Tori Spelling at the height of 90210 fame and how that real-life insecurity gave her a window into Angela’s shame and obsession.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is an I-Heart podcast. |
| 0:02.5 | Guaranteed human. |
| 0:10.6 | Amy Robach and T.J. Holmes present. |
| 0:13.5 | Killer Thriller with your host, Elisa Donovan. |
| 0:17.9 | Hey, everyone. Elisa Donovan here. |
| 0:20.0 | We're back with a new episode of Killer Thriller. |
| 0:23.4 | Today, we're going back to one of the most talked about true crime TV movies of the 90s, a film that still sparks conversation decades later. |
| 0:33.1 | You may know it as death of a cheerleader or maybe a friend to die for. |
| 0:38.6 | Same story, same tragedy, and it is very real. |
| 0:42.8 | The film is based on the 1984 murder of Kirsten Kostas, a popular high school student in |
| 0:48.7 | Northern California who was stabbed to death by her classmate, Bernadette Prottie, in a crime fueled by jealousy, |
| 0:56.5 | insecurity, and a desperate need to fit in. |
| 1:00.3 | And today's guest didn't play the victim. |
| 1:02.5 | She played the girl who killed her. |
| 1:05.1 | Kelly Martin starred as Angela Delvecchio, the fictionalized version of Bernadette, a role that |
| 1:10.6 | required stepping into the mind of a teenage girl unraveling under social pressure and obsession. |
| 1:16.9 | Okay, so before we get to Kelly, I am going to bring in my producer who is an extraordinary resource surrounding this case because she grew up in the town. I was 10. I was 10. It happened in |
| 1:30.6 | 84, right? Yes. So I was born in 74. And this was, we live in a small town. Like a small town, |
| 1:39.6 | you know, is all relative. It's not that small, but it's not in the middle of, right. It's not San |
| 1:46.4 | Francisco. It's not San Francisco. It's like a suburb of San Francisco. And I've talked about this |
| 1:52.2 | before. It weirds me out talking about it. I have to be honest because I get, I feel bad. I feel weird, I guess is the word. It was 40 years ago, 40 plus years ago, |
| 2:07.2 | 42 years ago. There's something about this thing that happened that when I talk about it, |
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