Guiding Light - NEWS ROOM

It's now official. When Josh returns from Afghanistan, he won't be coming back alone. Instead, he'll be bringing back his son Shayne. The role of Shanye has not been seen on-screen since 2004 when he was played by Marty West. This time around, the part will be filled by an actor who may be familiar to many watchers of Daytime, Jeff Branson.

The thirty-one year old actor already carved out a name for himself as someone to watch when he played the role of Jonathan Lavery on All My Children. He held that role from 2004 to 2007 and picked up a Daytime Emmy Award nomination in the category of Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series for it. In addition to his work on Daytime, he's also appeared on "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" and a score of films including "Shaft", "The Wolves of Wall Street" and "Swing Vote". Most recently he completed a role in the film "Doorman".

Branson will be the seventh actor to take on the role of Shayne following Travis Cartier, Brett Cooper, Garrett Stevens, Tony Michael Donnelly, Billy Kay and Marty West. The character was born on-screen in 1990, but this was later revised to 1985 thanks to SORAS. No word yet on how old he'll be this time. After a lengthy sojourn running an aid operation in Africa, what could the character be coming back for now? Will he be trying to get his parents back together and push Jeffrey out of the picture? Will he join his father in charity work? Will he hook up with Marina again? We'll have to wait and see. Anyway, according to our most recent poll, most of you seem excited at the prospect of having the character back and Soaps.com is excited at the new development too.

Branson will make his debut on December 1.