Zach Braff was stunned to realise his facial hair had turned grey.

The 39-year-old actor is usually asked to be clean-shaven in his film roles but took advantage of having some time off recently to cultivate a beard - and was shocked by the discoloured results.

He said: ''All the parts I ever do, they want me to be clean shaven, with the exception of that one season of 'Scrubs', when I grew what Dr Cox described as a 'puberty beard'.

''Now that I finally have some time off, I was free to let my facial hair grow, only to discover this last year of making 'Wish I Was Here' and doing a Broadway show has rendered it way more grey that I remember.''

Zach is friends with his former 'Scrubs' co-star Donald Faison and the pair are so close, he has already asked his pal to sing at his funeral after being forced to think about his death following a spoof online news report.

He explained in a Q&A with The Guardian: ''My ringtone is Donald singing 'You Are The Wind Beneath My Wings'.

''He sang it to me when the Internet, a few years back, tricked people into thinking I was dead. I asked Donald to join me in a video I made for Facebook, in order to correct the rumour - to sing 'Wind Beneath My Wings', because it made me realise if I died before him, I wanted him to sing it at my funeral.''