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Biography

Summer Glau (born July 24, 1981 in San Antonio, Texas) is an American dancer and actress, best known for her role as River Tam in the short-lived science fiction series Firefly and follow-up movie Serenity. She is of Scots-Irish and German descent. Glau was classically trained as a ballerina and also studied tango and flamenco. A professional dancer since age 12, Glau relocated to Los Angeles in 2002. She appeared in a few television commercials, but Glau's first television credit was a guest role as a ballerina on the 2002 episode "Waiting in the Wings" (episode 3x13) of the television series Angel. There she caught the eye of producer Joss Whedon, who later cast her in Firefly as River Tam.

Glau appears on the episode "Love Conquers Al" (1x06) of the TV series Cold Case. She has a small role in the film Sleepover, in which she plays a high school senior named Shelly. Summer 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 (Daniel Wisler). Glau plays Tess Doerner, a paranoid schizophrenic returnee in the second season premiere of The 4400 (episode "Wake-Up Call"), and the season three episodes "The Ballad of Kevin and Tess", "Terrible Swift Sword" and "Fifty-Fifty". Her character has the power to compel people to do whatever she wants. Glau stars in the science fiction film, Mammoth, which was filmed in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, U.S., and Bucharest, Romania.

In February 2007 it was announced that Glau would be playing the role of Cameron Phillips in The Sarah Connor Chronicles. This character is a Terminator infiltration unit sent back to protect John Connor and Sarah Connor from Skynet. Television episodes ("Extreme Rendition", "Force Majeure", "Report by Exception", "The Broom Cupboard", "Johnny B. Good", "The Water is Wide " and "Outsiders"). Television episodes ("Wake Up Call", "The Ballad of Kevin and Tess", "Terrible Swift Sword", "Fifty-Fifty", "The Wrath of Graham", "Daddy's Little Girl", "Ghost in the Machine" and "Tiny Machines")