Alan Coleman was an executive producer on hit New Zealand soap Shortland Street.
The TV producer responsible for some of the best known Aussie and Kiwi soaps, including Shortland Street, has died.
Alan Coleman, who was executive producer of Neighbours and also worked on Prisoner and The Young Doctors, died yesterday on the NSW Central Coast at the age of 76, his agent
Darren Gray told the Australian Associated Press.
Coleman was born in Birmingham in the UK and worked as the first director on Crossroads, the UK's first ever five-nights-a-week serial.
In 1974, he was headhunted by Australian television mogul Reg Grundy and moved to Australia with his family to help establish the Grundy Organisation's drama department.
Coleman was considered the driving force behind the hit medical soap The Young Doctors and worked as the producer of the show. He also worked on other Grundy shows such as the female inmate drama Prisoner.