James Coombes is a British

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 actor with a number of television

Television

Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...

 and theatre credits to his name.
He was educated at Glasllwch primary school and then Duffryn High School in Newport, S Wales.
He trained as an actor at the Birmingham School of Speech and Drama from 1975 -78.
He is known for his role as Pierre Challon during the final series of the BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 drama Howards' Way

Howards' Way

Howards' Way is a television drama series produced by BBC Birmingham and transmitted on BBC One between 1 September 1985 and 25 November 1990. The series deals with the personal and professional lives of the yachting and business communities in the fictional town of Tarrant on the South Coast of...

, and Grendel in HTV's Robin of Sherwood

Robin of Sherwood

Robin of Sherwood , was a British television series, based on the legend of Robin Hood. Created by Richard Carpenter, it was produced by HTV in association with Goldcrest, and ran from 1984 to 1986 on the ITV network. In America it was retitled Robin Hood and shown on the premium cable TV channel...

. He also appeared as Paroli in the 1984 Doctor Who

Doctor Who

Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...

serial Warriors of the Deep

Warriors of the Deep

Warriors of the Deep is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was broadcast in four twice-weekly parts from 5 January to 13 January 1984...

. Previously, he was to have provided the voice of the Krargs in the story Shada

Shada

Shada is an unaired serial of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It was intended to be the final serial of the 1979-80 season , but was never completed due to a strike at the BBC during filming...

but his voice-overs were never recorded as the story was halted by industrial action at the BBC. He has appeared in many films including Murder with Mirrors co-starring with Bette Davis

Bette Davis

Ruth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis was an American actress of film, television and theater. Noted for her willingness to play unsympathetic characters, she was highly regarded for her performances in a range of film genres, from contemporary crime melodramas to historical and period films and occasional...

 and Helen Hayes

Helen Hayes

Helen Hayes Brown was an American actress whose career spanned almost 70 years. She eventually garnered the nickname "First Lady of the American Theatre" and was one of twelve people who have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony Award...

 and played Richard Gere

Richard Gere

Richard Tiffany Gere is an American actor. He began acting in the 1970s, playing a supporting role in Looking for Mr. Goodbar, and a starring role in Days of Heaven. He came to prominence in 1980 for his role in the film American Gigolo, which established him as a leading man and a sex symbol...

's son, Amnon, in the Bible epic, King David. He also played Sir Lancelot in the Disney film, A Knight in Camelot with Whoopi Goldberg

Whoopi Goldberg

Whoopi Goldberg is an American comedian, actress, singer-songwriter, political activist, author and talk show host.Goldberg made her film debut in The Color Purple playing Celie, a mistreated black woman in the Deep South. She received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress and won...

. Other films include, Monarch, with T. P. McKenna

T. P. McKenna

Thomas Patrick McKenna , known professionally as T. P. McKenna, was an Irish actor who worked on stage, in film and television in Ireland and the UK from the 1950s.- Film and television :...

 and Jean Marsh

Jean Marsh

Jean Lyndsey Torren Marsh is an English actress, occasional screenwriter, and co-creator of the television series Upstairs, Downstairs and The House of Eliott....

.
He has worked extensively in the theatre including seasons at Chichester Festival, Pitlochry Festival, Bristol Old Vic, London Young Vic, Ludlow Festival, Chapter Arts in Cardiff with Sgript Cymru, and Scarborough for Sir Alan Ayckbourn
Other credits include: Minder on the Orient Express

Minder on the Orient Express

Minder on the Orient Express is a comedy/thriller television film made in 1985 as a spin-off from the successful television series Minder...

, Boon

Boon (TV series)

Boon is a British television drama and modern-day western series starring Michael Elphick, David Daker, and later Neil Morrissey. It was created by Jim Hill and Bill Stair and filmed by Central Television for ITV...

, Drop the Dead Donkey

Drop the Dead Donkey

- Major characters :* Gus Hedges — The unctuous Chief Executive of the company, and yes-man to Sir Roysten Merchant. A management stereotype, complete with clichés and clumsy metaphors, he swiftly transforms GlobeLink from a serious news network to a ratings-chasing tabloid channel...

, Heartbeat, Bugs

Bugs (TV series)

Bugs was a British television drama series which ran for four series from April 1995 to August 1999. The programme, a mixture of action/adventure and science-fiction, involved a team of specialist independent crime-fighting technology experts, who faced a variety of threats based around computers...

, Holby City

Holby City

Holby City, stylised as Holby Ci+y, is a British medical drama television series that airs weekly on BBC One.The series was created by Tony McHale and Mal Young as a spin-off from the established BBC medical drama Casualty, and premiered on 12 January 1999...

, The Bill

The Bill

The Bill is a police procedural television series that ran from October 1984 to August 2010. It focused on the lives and work of one shift of police officers, rather than on any particular aspect of police work...

, My Family and Dinosapien

Dinosapien

Dinosapien is a British/Canadian children's television program produced jointly by BBC Worldwide and Cambium Catalyst International with SEVEN24 Films....

As well as acting, he tutors regularly at the Academy of Creative Training

Academy of Creative Training

The Academy of Creative Training is an independent drama school in Brighton, East Sussex, England. ACT has two sites: one in Kemptown, Brighton and one in Hove - History :The school was founded by actor and director John Moulder Brown in 1997...

 in Brighton

Brighton

Brighton is the major part of the city of Brighton and Hove in East Sussex, England on the south coast of Great Britain...

.

James Coombes was born in Newport, South Wales and is married to the actress, Cathy Finlay, daughter of actor Frank Finlay

Frank Finlay

Francis Finlay, CBE is an English stage, film and television actor.-Personal life:Finlay was born in Farnworth, Lancashire, the son of Margaret and Josiah Finlay, a butcher. A devout Catholic, he belongs to the British Catholic Stage Guild. He was educated at St...

.
His eldest son, Josh Coombes, is drummer for pop/punk band, The Hype Theory.

External links