Alister Smart

Alister Smart was an Australian actor, television presenter and director whose face and voice reached generations of children as an original host of the ABC's Play School. He died on 9 September 2026 in Bairnsdale, Victoria, at the age of 90, after living in East Gippsland in later years.

Born in Adelaide on 30 November 1935, and raised in part around Nowra, he began in theatre in the early 1950s with Dragon's Mouth before travelling to England. From 1953 he worked at Cheltenham's Everyman Theatre and later with companies in Coventry and Leicester, including the Century Theatre's touring wagon. British television credits included ITV Play of the Week, Comedy Playhouse and Emergency Ward 10. Returning to Australia he appeared in the 1963 ABC co-production The Right Thing and built a long list of guest roles across Skippy, Riptide, The Sullivans, Cop Shop, Number 96, Glenview High and many others.

Play School made him a national figure. He appeared in the programme's debut episode in 1966 and remained a presenter for about 27 years until the early 1990s, sharing the toy-box set with colleagues such as Lorraine Bayly, Anne Haddy, Don Spencer, Benita Collings, Noni Hazlehurst, John Waters and Philip Quast. For many Australian children he was simply one of the adults who opened the windows and sang along.

Parallel to presenting he became a prolific television director. He steered roughly 88 episodes of Sons and Daughters and also directed A Country Practice, Prisoner, Neighbours, E Street, Blue Heelers, Richmond Hill, Cop Shop and Rafferty's Rules, plus family films including The Time Game and You and Me and Uncle Bob. That combination of on-camera warmth and behind-the-camera craft made him unusual even among Australian television all-rounders.

He was married to British actress Margery Milne, whom he met while working in Leicester. Industry tributes after his death, including a Vale notice on TV Tonight published on 2 October 2026, remembered a pioneering Play School presence and a craftsman director of Australian soap and drama. His Wikipedia entry and Australian screen databases preserve a career that stretched from 1950s stage work to mid-1990s network television.