Biography

Summer Lyn Glau (born July 24, 1981) is a gifted American classically trained ballerina-turned-actress.

She is widely known for her role in science fiction and fantasy television series, as River Tam in Firefly (2002) and its continuation film, Serenity (2005).

However, anyone who watches her films can tell that she is a phenomenal actress.

Early Life

The actress, Summer Glau was born in San Antonio, Texas, to parents Mari Glau and Mark Glau on July, 24, 1981.

Her mother worked as a school teacher, while her dad a general contractor.

Growing up, Summer Glau was home-schooled because she was simultaneously training to become a classical ballet dancer.

Ballet dancing takes a lot of dedication, and performers take about ten years to become classical ballet dancers.

Her dedication paid off as Summer Glau gradually became a phenomenal dancer, was a soloist with her ballet company and started working with a symphony at 14-years-old. Sadly, her career as a dancer was cut short.

Ballet is a beautiful and powerful form of dance. But, unfortunately, it has been known to cause dancers’ hip, foot, knee, and ankle injuries. Stress fractures and arthritis are pretty common as well.

In Summer Glau‘s case, her problem started with a broken toe which she didn’t take time off to let heal. She danced on this toe for four months.

Summer Glau eventually developed tendonitis in her ankle, which led to her losing all mobility on her foot. She was 19 years old, and that was the end of her ballet dancing career.

Before becoming a star actress, Summer says she worked in commercials and danced the tango for about a year as a way to pay her bills.

Education

Summer Glau received a scholarship to a ballet company and was homeschooled from grades 3 to 12 to accommodate her ballet training. In addition to her classical ballet training, she studied tango and flamenco.

Career

After her dreams of becoming a ballerina were cut short by injuries, Summer Glau left her home in Texas and headed for Los Angeles.

After being in L.A for two years, she landed her first on-screen job in 2001 on Joss Whedon‘s series, Angel. A fun coincidence is that her first-ever role was playing a ballerina.

Filmography

• Sleepover as Ticket girl (2004)
• Serenity as River Tam (2005)
• Mammoth as Jack Abernathy (2006)
• The Initiation of Sarah as Lindsey Goodwin (2006)
• Superman/Batman: Apocalypse las Kara Zor-El/Supergirl (voice) 2010
• Deadly Honeymoon as Lindsey Ross Forrest (2010)
• The Legend of Hell’s Gate: An American Conspiracy as Maggie Moon (2011)
• Help for the Holidays as Christine (2012)
• Inside the Box as Sophie(2013)
• Knights of Badassdom as Gwen(2013)
• Dead End as Franck’s wife & Fugitive (2015)

Television Edit

• Angel as Prima Ballerina, Episode: “Waiting in the Wings”(2002)
• Firefly as River Tam, 14 episodes (2002–2003)
• Cold Case as Paige Pratt Episode: “Love Conquers Al”(2003)
• CSI: Crime Scene Investigation Mandy Cooper Episode: “What’s Eating Gilbert Grissom?”(2004)
• The 4400 Tess Doerner 8 episodes (2005–2007)
• The Unit Crystal Burns 7 episodes (2006–2007)
• Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles as Cameron / Allison Young 31 episodes (as Cameron),(2008–2009) 2 episodes (as Allison Young)
• The Big Bang Theory as Herself Episode: “The Terminator Decoupling” (2009)
• Dollhouse Bennett Halverson 4 episodes(2009–2010)
• Chuck Greta Episode: “Chuck Versus the Fear of Death”(2010)
• The Cape as Jamie Fleming / Orwell 10 episodes (2011)
• Alphas as Skylar Adams 4 episodes (2011–2012)
• Grey’s Anatomy as Nurse Emily Kovach 2 episodes
• Scent of the Missing Sedona Pilot
• Hawaii Five as 0 Maggie Hoapili Episode: “Kekoa”(2013)
• NTSF:SD:SUV:: Olivia Frampton Episode: “Comic-Con Air”(2013)
• Arrow as Isabel Rochev/Ravager 9 episodes(2013–2014)
• Peter Panzerfaust as Wendy (voice) (2014)
• Sequestered as Anna Brandt 12 episodes
• Castle as Kendall Frost Episode: “The G.D.S.”(2016)
• Wu Assassins Miss Jones (The Water Wu) 2 episodes (2019)

Online Media

• R. Tam sessions River as Tam 5 short videos(2005)
• Ctrl Alt Destroy as Narrator and all characters Literary RPG podcast(2021)

Awards & Nominations

• 2005, SFX Award won the Best Actress for her role in Serenity
• 2006, SyFy Genre Awards Nominated for Best Actress/Movie for her role in Serenity
• 2006, Saturn Award Best won Supporting Actress for Serenity
• 2008, Saturn Award Best Supporting Actress on Television Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles Won (tied with Elizabeth Mitchell)
• 2008, Scream Award Best Actress in a Science Fiction Movie or TV Show Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicle was Nominated
• 2008, Teen Choice Award Choice TV Actress: Action Adventure Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles was Nominated
• 2008, Teen Choice Award Choice TV Breakout Female Star Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles was Nominated
• 2009, Saturn Award Best Supporting Actress on Television Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles was Nominated
• 2009, Teen Choice Award Choice TV Actress: Action Adventure Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles was nominated.

Social Media

The actress, Summer Glau has a good number of followers on Twitter and Instagram and lots of fan pages.

• Summer Glau (@SummerLGlau) / Twitter
• Summer Glau (@glausummer) • Instagram photos and videos

Personal Life

Summer Glau has been married to Val Morrison since 2014. In 2015, the actress gave birth to their first child, Milena Jo Morrison. Their second daughter Sunny Isabou was born in October 2017.

Summer Glau has been off the screen for a while now and seems to be slowly making a comeback. Hopefully, she will be back to filming and making her mark as a fantastic martial artist and film star soon.

Net Worth

The dancer-turned-actor, Summer Glau is quite well off. Her vast net worth is estimated to be about US$4 million.