The cast of Glee will receive grief counselling when they return to work next month (Aug13) following the death of the show's star Cory Monteith.

The 31-year-old actor was found dead in a hotel room in Vancouver, Canada last weekend (13-14Jul13) after bingeing on heroin and alcohol, and his passing threw the rest of the cast into mourning.

Work on the show is set to resume next month with the filming of two Beatles-themed episodes, and creator Ryan Murphy has now revealed he is hiring a team of grief counsellors to help the stars deal with their loss.

He tells E! News, "People want to be together and I think it's important that people have an outlet for counselling, which we're providing on set for two weeks... For many people in the cast and many people on the crew, because they are of a younger group, you know Cory's death is the first death that they've had to experience in their lives. I think that a lot of fans are going through that same thing... That's why we're providing counselling and that's why we want people to feel that we have, not only a memorial for Cory, but a memorial for (his character) Finn. I have no doubt it's going to be an incredibly rough time, but what else do you do?"

Murphy will film three episodes, including a tribute episode to say farewell to Monteith's character, before embarking on a hiatus, but he insists the cast, including Monteith's real life girlfriend Lea Michele, wanted to get back to work so they can "grieve together and talk about him".

He also hopes dealing with Monteith's death onscreen might help other young addicts deal with their own problems: "One of the most gratifying things about Glee is that when the show is at its best, it has helped young people and given them information about the human condition that moves and informs them. What we've been talking about in the writer's room is that maybe the way we deal with this tragedy might save the life of someone."