Toma gained global fame after starring in the film Queen of the Gypsies directed by Emil Loteanu, which brought her huge international success as an actress.

Her father was Andrei V. Fomichev (originally from the village Somovka Dobrinsky District of the Lipetsk region), chairman of the "Truth" collective farm in the Balti area.

[3][4][5] Her Jewish mother, Ides Saulovna Sukhaya (?–1987), was a member of a communist underground movement (messenger) in Bessarabia in 1930; together with her sisters Bertha, Sarah, Rebecca, Ada, and Anna, she kept a collection of banned literature in her basement.

Svetlana Toma graduated from the acting department; an objective course of the Russian State Institute of Performing Arts.

[10] She also acted in films by other famous directors, including Vladimir Vengerov - "The Living Corpse" (1969), Yan Frid - "Pious Martha" (1982), Pavel Chukhray - "People in the ocean" (1979), Vladimir Basov - "Seven shouts in the ocean" (1981), Valeriy Ahadov - "Family business Gayurovyh"(1974), Rustam Ibragimbekov - "Solo for baritone and Orchestra" (1977) and others.

[11] In 1999, together with other artists, she took part in a project with Victor Merezhko and composer Eugene Bednenko named "The Stars of Theater and Cinema are Singing," where she was a performer of retro songs.