Alan Coleman is a prolific TV series writer, director and producer, primarily in the southern hemisphere where he worked on soap operas The Young Doctors

The Young Doctors

The Young Doctors is an Australian early evening soap opera. The series was set in the fictional Albert Memorial hospital and primarily concerned with romances between younger members of the hospital staff, screened on the Nine Network from Monday, 8 November 1976 until Wednesday, 30 March...

(which he also created), The Restless Years

The Restless Years

The Restless Years is an Australian soap opera which followed the lives of several Sydney school-leavers and young adults. It was produced by the Reg Grundy Organisation for Network Ten. It debuted December 1977 and ran until late 1981. It was not renewed by the network due to declining ratings...

, Punishment

Punishment (TV series)

Punishment is an Australian television soap opera made by the Reg Grundy Organisation for the Ten Network in 1981.Set in a fictional men's prison, the series attempted to present a male version of the successful soap Prisoner...

, Neighbours

Neighbours

Neighbours is an Australian television soap opera first broadcast on the Seven Network on 18 March 1985. It was created by TV executive Reg Watson, who proposed the idea of making a show that focused on realistic stories and portrayed adults and teenagers who talk openly and solve their problems...

and Shortland Street

Shortland Street

Shortland Street is a New Zealand prime-time soap opera, first broadcast on Television New Zealand's TV2 on 25 May 1992. It is the country's longest-running drama and soap opera, being broadcast continuously for over 4500 episodes and 19 years, and is one of the most watched television programs in...

. He was originally the head of children's programming at ATV

Associated TeleVision

Associated Television, often referred to as ATV, was a British television company, holder of various licences to broadcast on the ITV network from 24 September 1955 until 00:34 on 1 January 1982...

 in the UK until emigrating to Australia in 1974. In 1997, he directed several episodes of the British soap opera, Family Affairs

Family Affairs

Family Affairs was a British soap opera broadcast on Five, from 1997 to 2005. It was the second programme to be broadcast on the channel on 30 March 1997, the channel's launch night...

as a part of a working holiday in the UK. At one point, he also temporarily parted company with the Reg Grundy

Reg Grundy

Reginald Roy "Reg" Grundy, AC, OBE is one of the most successful Australian entrepreneurs, and media and television moguls of his generation.He was the only child born to Roy Grundy and Lillian Lees...

production stable to establish his own company which provided television coverage of major sporting events. Before going behind the camera, he originally worked as an actor and is on record as saying that 'you cannot be a good director unless you have acted yourself'.

In 2008 Alan was presented with the inaugural Lifetime Achievement Award for his outstanding contribution to the 'soap opera' industry at The Soap Shows- Aussie Soap Awards.

Alan's autobiography, One Door Shuts, was self-published through Trafford Publishing in 2009.