He worked at a factory before World War II and made his film debut as a Mosfilm acting studio student, appearing in diverse episodic roles in Grigori Roshal's The Oppenheim Family, Konstantin Yudin's A Girl with a Temper, and Vsevolod Pudovkin's Minin and Pozharsky in 1939.

He graduated from the studio in 1940 and joined the troupe of the Central Theater of the Red Army, fought as a soldier in World War II, and worked in Moscow after his discharge.

Gluzsky often appeared in the role of a headstrong leader but also successfully took on the depiction of reflective intellectuals.

[2] Awarded the title of honor of People's Artist of the USSR in 1983, he headed the acting workshop of the All-Union State Institute of Cinematography from 1988 to 1996.

[2] One of the most recognizable faces of Soviet and Russian cinema, Mikhail Gluzsky continued to work as an actor even amid the economic crisis of the 1990s, which hit Boris Yeltsin's Russia hard and affected the film industry harshly.