Summer Glau

Summer Lyn Glau (pronounced /ˈɡlaʊ/; born July 24, 1981) is an American actress, known for playing River Tam in the science fiction series Firefly and follow-up movie Serenity, and for playing Cameron in the series Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.

Early life

Glau was born in San Antonio, Texas, where she grew up with her two younger sisters. She is ofScots-Irish and German descent. Her mother is a schoolteacher and her father a general contractor.

Glau received a scholarship to a ballet company and was home-schooled from grades 3 to 12 to accommodate her ballet training. Glau was classically trained as a ballet dancer and also studied tango and flamenco. After a serious ankle injury ended her dancing career, Glau later moved to Los Angeles in 2002 to pursue a more active acting career.

Career

Glau's first television credit was a guest role as a ballerina on the 2002 episode "Waiting in the Wings" of the television series Angel. There she caught the eye of director Joss Whedon, who later cast her in his critically acclaimed but short-lived TV series Firefly as River Tam, a role she reprised for the show's feature film sequel, Serenity. Glau previously auditioned for the role as a Pink Ranger on one of the Power Rangers series before meeting Joss Whedon.

Glau appeared on the episode "Love Conquers Al" of the TV series Cold Case. She had a small role in the film Sleepover, in which she played a high school senior named Shelly. She also appeared in the CSI episode "What's Eating Gilbert Grissom?", and the second season of The Unit; portraying Crystal Burns, the girlfriend of Jeremy Erhart. In 2006, Glau played Tess Doerner, a paranoid schizophrenic returnee in the second season premiere of The 4400 (episode "Wake-Up Call"), and became a recurring character from season 3 onwards. She also starred in the science fiction film Mammoth. Glau was cast in the ABC Family TV movie The Initiation of Sarah.

Glau at CollectorMania 2007

In Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, a series that debuted January 13, 2008, Glau played the role of Cameron Phillips, a Terminator infiltration unit sent back to protect John Connor and Sarah Connor fromSkynet. The seventh episode of the series, "The Demon Hand", included several scenes in which Glau (in character as Cameron) dances ballet. Glau also guest starred as herself in the 2009 episode "The Terminator Decoupling" from the second season of the CBS situation comedy The Big Bang Theory.

On August 26, 2009, it was confirmed after much speculation that Glau would be joining the cast of Joss Whedon's Dollhouse for at least two episodes in the early part of the show's second season. She portrayed Bennett, the programmer for a rival Dollhouse.

On March 12, 2010, it was announced that she would be joining the cast of NBC's The Cape in a leading role. In June 2010 was confirmed as the female lead in the black comedy flick The Knights of Badassdom.

Glau voiced Kara Zor-El in the DC Comics original animated movie Superman/Batman: Apocalypse.

Awards

Glau was voted Best Actress of 2005 by readers of SFX magazine and received a 2005 Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in Serenity. She was also runner up for Best Actress/Movie in the SyFy Genre Awards for 2006.

In 2008, she received the Best Supporting Television Actress award at the 34th Saturn Awards for her performance as Cameron Phillips inTerminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles,^[14] and was nominated for the Spike TV Scream Awards in the category Best Actress in a Science Fiction Movie or TV Show for the same role.

Personal life

Summer Glau has been involved in a number of charities, such as B.C. Women's Hospital & Health Centrewhere she autographed several teddy bears to be sold on eBay to help raise money for the Hospital. Glau is an animal lover and has shown support to the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Los Angeles, where she hand-painted a decorative pet bowl that was later sold on eBay to raise funds. She became a vegetarian in 1995 but stated she ate steaks during the filming on the 2005 film Serenity due to the amount of physical training required. Glau has trained in multiple forms of martial arts, including kung fu and kickboxing.

Filmography

List of works

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2002	Angel	Prima Ballerina	Episode: "Waiting in the Wings"
2002–2003	Firefly	River Tam	Series regular, 14 episodes
2003	Cold Case	Paige Pratt	Episode: "Love Conquers Al"
2004	Sleepover	Ticket Girl
2004	CSI: Crime Scene Investigation	Mandy Cooper	Episode: "What's Eating Gilbert Grissom?"
2005	Serenity	River Tam
2005–2007	The 4400	Tess Doerner	8 episodes
2006	Mammoth	Jack Abernathy	TV movie
2006	The Initiation of Sarah	Lindsey Goodwin	TV movie
2006–2007	The Unit	Crystal Burns	7 episodes
2008–2009	Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles	Cameron Phillips / Allison Young	Series regular, 31 episodes
2009	The Big Bang Theory	Herself	1 episode The Terminator Decoupling
2009–2010	Dollhouse	Bennett Halverson	4 episodes
2010	Chuck	Greta	Episode: "Chuck Versus the Fear of Death"
2010	Deadly Honeymoon	Lindsey Ross Forrest	TV movie
2010	Superman/Batman: Apocalypse	Kara / Supergirl (voice)	Video
2010	Good Morning Rabbit	Lucy	Episode: "National Hamburger Day"
2011	The Knights of Badassdom	Gwen	Post-Production
2011	The Legend of Hell's Gate: An American Conspiracy	Maggie Moon	Completed
2011	The Cape	Orwell	Series regular

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