At the age of 3, she moved with her parents to Los Angeles where her father became a wholesales grocery salesman for S. E. Rykoff. He died in 1928. In 1919 Sofia's mother became the first Greek actress to perform in a Hollywood motion picture. Sofia's mother remarried in 1936 to Anthony Xydias, the first Greek silent film producer most noted for making over 100 historical western films. Sofia's education began by attending the Los Angeles public schools, graduating from Los Angeles High School in 1933.