Summer Glau

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 now appears on the Fox network TV series Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles as Cameron Phillips. Glau was classically trained as a ballerina and also studied tango and flamenco. A professional dancer since age 12, she appeared in a few television commercials.

Having relocated to Los Angeles in 2002, 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 director Joss Whedon, who later cast her in his short-lived TV series Firefly as River Tam, a role she reprised for the show's feature film sequel, Serenity.

Summer Glau appeared on the episode "Love Conquers Al" (1x06) 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 reprised the role in the season three episodes "The Ballad of Kevin and Tess", "Terrible Swift Sword" and "Fifty-Fifty". Her character had the power to compel people to do whatever she wants. She also starred in the science fiction film Mammoth.

Summer 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 and was runner up for Best Actress/Movie in the SyFy Genre Awards for 2006.

In Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, a series that debuted January 13, 2008, Glau plays the role of Cameron Phillips, a Terminator infiltration unit sent back to protect John Connor and Sarah Connor from Skynet. The seventh episode of the series, "The Demon's Hand", included several scenes in which Glau (in character as Cameron) dances ballet.