Biography

Summer Lyn Glau was born on July 24, 1981, in San Antonio Texas. Even though she grew up close to the Mexican border, she’s not of Latin origins. Her ancestors were German, Irish and Scottish.
She has two younger sisters Christie and Kaitlin. Her father is a general contractor and her mother is a schoolteacher.

Because of her very rigorous ballet training schedule Summer was home schooled by her mother Mari from grades 3 to 12.

Summer trained and performed as a ballerina dancer but also studied tango and flamenco. Throughout her teenage years she danced at the Majestic Theatre in shows like Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, The Happy Widow, Peer Gynt or Paint Your Wagon.

She danced until a serious injury to a foot forced her to take time to heal. During this time, while visiting friends in Los Angeles she booked her first acting job. Shortly after, she made the decision to move to LA and began working steadily as an actor and dancer.

“I danced classical ballet my whole life. That was my destiny; that was my identity. I was known as Summer The Dancer. And I thought that’s what I’d do all my life.”

Summer’s first television series role was a guest spot on Joss Whedon’s Angel in the now classic 2002 episode “Waiting in the Wings”, in which she was able to demonstrate both her acting skills and her ballet training.

Soon after, she was cast in Whedon’s new series, Firefly, playing the role of the very traumatized River Tam, in this epic science-fiction/western show.

After the series cancellation she appeared in several famous series such as Cold Case, CSI, and The 4400. She also had a small part in the MGM feature Sleepover, in the role of a high school senior named Shelly.

“The thing about River that I like, is that she doesn’t have a lot of lines. Especially in the series she had to show what she was thinking just by the way she moved or by how her face was moving. I think that has helped me a lot as an actor.”

Due to the successful sales of the Firefly DVD Box set and the massive fan campaign a sequel of Firefly, Serenity, came to life in 2005.

Summer reprised her role of River Tam in this Universal movie, in which she was given a more significant part. She had to go through 6 month of training and 3 month of fight-camp, for the movie. A special style of fighting was created especially for her, to use the amazing dancing skills and flexibility that she possesses. She realised 90% of the stunts herself.

For her acclaimed role in Serenity she won a Saturn Award (Best Supporting Actress) and an SFX Award (Best Actress).

“Adam Baldwin (Jayne on Serenity) is one of my favourites, he’s full on, he told me ‘you just go for it girl, you won’t hurt me’.
It’s great to beat up on him, it never gets old.”

In 2006 Summer played two major roles in two very different movies.

Firstly Vincent Ventresca’s daughter Jack in the Sci-Fi comedy Mammoth where she fought an alien-infected centuries-old mammoth. The movie was shot in Louisiana and Bucarest (Roumania).
She later played Mika Boreem’s twin sister Lindsey in the ABC horror movie The Initiation of Sarah, it was a remake of the 1979 horror movie.

Both roles earned her some fair critics in the press and were released on DVD in 2007.

“This is the only show I have done with a bunch of girls my own age. We laughed and laughed! Mika and I were like real sisters.”

That same year she also appeared in three episodes of the third season of Coppola’s The 4400, reprising her role of schizophrenic returnee Tess Doerner already played in one of the 2nd season’s episode in 2005.

She gave life again to a character that had been written especially for her after she had to step back from playing the part of The 4400’s returnee Lily Moore because of conflicting schedules with the shooting of Serenity.

Her character has had a nice development in this season, which allowed Summer to demonstrate some new acting skills.

“My character might be creepy, but I think our relationship (Tess/Kevin) is sweet. It’s different; so different, you know?”

Summer also got cast as Crystal Burns in the second season of CBS’s military drama The Unit. Sean Ryan knew her work from Firefly and asked for her.

She guest starred in six episodes throughout the season. This new role, quite different from everything she had played before, gave her the opportunity to explore new part of herself as an actress.

It also introduced the fans to her real-life boyfriend, fellow Texan actor Daniel Wisler, who played her on-screen boyfriend on the show.

“It was exciting for me to get to push myself in a new direction. It’s definitely very different from anything that I’ve done. It’s definitely more sexy. She’s more aggressive. She’s manipulative. And it was actually really fun for me!”

In 2007 Summer came back as a guest for five episodes on The 4400, giving life once again to the schizophrenic Tess Doerner. She also started working mid-year on a new highly secret project. In late 2007 and after much speculation, it was finaly revealed that Summer was going to portray Cameron Phillips, a good Terminator in the upcoming film tie-in television series Terminato: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. This new Fox series will start on January 13, 2008.

Most recently, Joss Whedon revealed to the press that he was currently working on the score of a ballet movie The Serving Girl and that Summer will be playing the lead character.