Shane West is an actor, musician (punk) and a songwriter. He was born as Shannon Bruce Snaith on June 10, 1978 to Leah Catherine and Don Snaith at Baton Rouge, Louisiana, U.S. Shane’s mother is of Cajun French lineage while his father is a Jamaican, British and Portuguese lineage. His parents had a divorce in year 1982 when he was just four years old. His passion for punk music was influenced by his (punk musicians) parents. At ten, he moved to Compton, California to look for a job. Later, he shifted to Norwalk then transferred to Los Angeles to pursue his career in acting. In the first two years, the actor has struggled a lot and he lives in his manager’s place before he was debuted as an actor in year 1995 through the television drama, Picket Fences. He appeared in the episode, ‘Heart of Saturday Night’ in the season 4 of the show and bagged the role of Dave Lattimore.
In year 1998, he made a guest-star appearance in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer and essayed the role of Mark Tapper in The Cider House Rules. He bagged his first major role as Eli Sammler, a young basketball player who has learning disability on ABC television series, Once and Again. He was debuted in the big screen through the comedy-drama film, Liberty Heights in 1999. Shane was later co-starred with Marla Sokoloff,
James Franco
and Jodi Lyn O’Keefe in the teen comedy film, Whatever It Takes in year 2000. In 2001, he played as Bentley ‘
Striker
’ Scrumfeld in another teen comedy film, Get Over It.
In 2002, he was co-starred with
Mandy Moore
in the film adaptation of the novel, A Walk to Remember by Nicholas Spark. The film grossed $41-Million in U.S. and Shane received the Teen Choice Award for Choice Chemistry with Many Moore. He was also seen in the music video ‘Cry’ by Moore. He also earned the Young Hollywood Award Male Superstar of Tomorrow.
In year 2003, he was starred in the superhero film, The League of Extraordinary Gentleman as Tom Sawyer in 2003 together with
Sean Connery
. This film received a commercial success and grossed $179-Million worldwide. After a year, Shane was cast on NBC’s longest running medical drama series, ER and donned the role of Ray Barnett. In 2007, he left the show and was featured in Supreme Courtships. He later returned to ER on its final season. Shane also acted in the independent biographical film, What We Do Is Secret as Darby Crash, the lead vocalist of the band, The Germs. The brilliant actor received positive reviews for his portrayal in the film. He also gained the Rising Star Award at the Philadelphia Film Festival. From 2010 to 2013, he was starred in the television series, Nikita as Michael Bishop. In 2014, he was co-starred as Captain John Alden, a war veteran in the historical fantasy, Salem.
Shane is also the lead vocal of the band, Johnny Was which was initially known as Average Joe.