Desperate Housewives Exclusive: Cynthia Watros cast as Brie's Crazy Friend

Cynthia Watros is going back to her nutcase roots. The House and Lost actress — who picked up an Emmy in 1998 for portraying psycho stalker Annie Dutton on Guiding Light — is headed to Desperate Housewives to play Bree’s (literally) crazy friend, sources confirm to me exclusively.

We’ll meet Watros’s character in Housewives‘ ninth episode when she accompanies Bree and new boytoy Keith (Brian Austin Green) on a double date. Rumor has it Watros’ escort for the evening is Keith’s pa, played by John Schneider.

Watros will juggle her one-episode Housewives stint with her current recurring role as Wilson’s ex-wife-turned-girlfriend Sam on House.

Guiding Light Fades to Black

After 72 years on the air, Guiding Light is over.

Longtime fans said goodbye to their favorite dramatic and dysfunctional families, the Spauldings and the Lewises, on Friday, when CBS aired the soap’s final episode after many seasons of marriages, divorces, remarriages, scandals, back-from-the-dead encounters and numerous miracles — seven! — that had paralyzed characters walking again.

But beyond the melodrama, Guiding Light bolstered the careers of many of Hollywood’s most famous stars. Before Footloose, Kevin Bacon played alcoholic teen T. J. ‘Tim’ Werner in 1980. James Earl Jones was one of the first African-American actors to have a regular role on a soap, when he starred in the 1960s. Heroes star Hayden Panettiere played a young Lizzie Spaulding from 1996 to 2000. And die-hard fans will even remember when Calista Flockhart had a minor role as a babysitter in the late ’80s.

As soap operas struggle to remain profitable and reality shows provide a heaping portion of heartache and backstabbing, the dimming of Guiding Light truly marks the end of an era.