Alistair Cooke KBE (November 20, 1908 - March 30, 2004) was a British/American journalist, television personality and broadcaster. Outside his journalistic output, which included Letter from America and Alistair Cooke's America, he was well known in the United States as the host of PBS Masterpiece Theater from 1971 to 1992. After holding the job for 22 years, and having been in television for 42 years, Cooke retired in 1992.

Born in North West England and educated at Jesus College, Cambridge, he became a naturalized American citizen in later life, and lived in New York City with his family, reporting mainly for the BBC.

Born in Salford, Lancashire, Britain, to a Methodist father and an Irish mother, as Alfred Cooke, he legally added the name "Alistair" at the age of 22. He was educated at Blackpool Grammar School and was awarded a scholarship to study at Jesus College, Cambridge, where he gained an honours degree (2:1) in English. He was heavily involved in the arts of the college, becoming the editor of The Granta, the student magazine, and setting up the Mummers, the first co-sex theatre group, from which he notably rejected a young James Mason, telling him to stick to architecture.