South African-born actor Dean Geyer has landed a role alongside Lea Michele in the hit US television show Glee.

Geyer will star as Brody Weston, an upperclassman at NYADA - the New York arts school where Michele's character Rachel studies in the show's fourth season. According to various reports, Brody will act as a mentor to Rachel, and may possibly try to woo. Her love interest for the first three seasons was fellow Glee-club member Finn (played by Michele's real-life boyfriend Cory Monteith).

The 26-year-old Geyer — who was born in Johannesburg — moved to Australia in 2001 after one year at KES in Johannesburg, and enrolled at Melbourne High School, where he continued to play rugby and formed a band in his final school year in 2004.

In 2006, Geyer entered and came third in Australian Idol, and released his first album called Rush in 2007. In November that year, Geyer signed on to popular Australian soap opera Neighbours as series regular Ty Harper.

Geyer also landed a role in Fox's now-cancelled Terra Nova, in which he played a character called Mark Reynolds, before being cast as Brody in the hit musical show.

In an interview with SAbona magazine, Geyer revealed that his family had to incorporate a hard "G" into the surname when moving to Australia, saying: "Something we had to do before we immigrated was alter the pronunciation of our surname. My grandpa advised us to do this and we are so glad we did. The guttural sounding 'G' does not quite resonate with Australians!"

The fourth season of Glee kicks off in America on 13 September 2012.