Anna Coombs has worked in London's West End, at Dublin's Abbey Theatre, with Peter Cheeseman at The New Vic, Stoke on Trent, at The Marlowe Theatre Canterbury and at The Oxford Playhouse. At Hall for Cornwall, Truro, she developed its producing, education and new writing programmes and directed Marlowe’s The Jew Of Malta with Joseph Mydell as Barabas – the first black actor to play a Marlowe protagonist in the UK. At HfC she produced RESPONSES (2007) ten original new plays in response to the English Renaissance, bricks & mortar (2008) with 40 African and European artists and Beach Combing (2009), 3 new plays at London’s Theatre503, and directed a number of new plays including BLOOD and Glass Heart by Victoria Field, Highfliers by Henry Darke and the first UK revival of Never Say Rabbit In A Boat by her friend and long time collaborator, the Cornishman Nick Darke, who died in 2005. This production was her tribute to Nick.
 
In May 2010 Anna took up an attachment at The National Theatre Studio, followed by a spell as resident director at NITRO. In 2011 she returned to The NT to direct Koa Odour Antony’s play Makmende Vies for President, in English, Sheng and Swahili, for The National Theatre African Playwriting Project. She has directed all of Tangle’s productions, most recently The Crossing (2012). She is a freelance casting director, specialising in African – Caribbean casting, a Research Associate in African Theatre at SOAS, University of London, and a Panellist for Yinka Shonibare MBE (RA)’s Guest Projects Africa.