The creative director of the BBC is embroiled in a new crisis over alegations that he presented the film of an American director as his own work.

Alan Yentob has been accused of presenting a film about a reclusive 1960s pop star as his own when the interview was in fact conducted by Stephen Kijak, a US film-maker.

Viewers who have seen the film on Scott Walker, part of Yentob’s Imagine series on BBC1, claim the programme was a “shameful deception” because it left the impression that Yentob had done the interview.

The BBC insists Yentob - who has said there can be “artifice without deception” - has done nothing wrong and used standard industry practice by editing Kijak out of his own film. The controversy, however, raises new questions about widespread broadcasting techniques.

The disclosure follows a series of scandals of misrepresentation at the BBC that led to the departure of Peter Fincham, the BBC1 controller. It also comes on the eve of a critical meeting to decide on cuts of more than 2,000 jobs.

The programme, broadcast in May, was a profile of Walker and included a rare interview with him. The BBC bought Kijak’s biopic, and with his approval carefully excised the original narrator, inserted Yentob’s voice and removed segments that indicated it was Kijak who conducted the interview.

Much of the script narrated by Yentob remained identical to Kijak’s, as did other elements of the programme. Kijak was listed only in the brief end credits as a co-director. It was not made clear that Yentob and his team had simply reedited a film that had already won acclaim among Walker fans.

Yentob has previously been accused of misleading viewers by filming cutaway “noddy” shots in interviews at which he had not been present. BBC staff, however, found no evidence of this. He was previously cleared of fiddling his expenses after a BBC investigation.

Mike von Joel, editor of State of the Art magazine, who raised the issue, accused Yentob in the magazine’s latest edition of “self-aggrandisement” and inserting himself into the film “appearing to all intents and purposes to be conducting the interviews and linking the strands”.

He said last week that Imagine should be championing independent film-makers and questioned why Yentob did not make clear that the interview with Scott was reedited from an independent film. “What is Yentob doing taking other people’s films and not giving them the proper credit for it?”

Fans of Kijak’s work have also attacked the BBC programme as a “crude reworking” of the original film. On the website for 30 Century Man, one fan has written to Kijak: “To steal your work and to pass it off as if he had done all those interviews, got access to Scott . . . it’s just a shameful deception. On this occasion, the BBC has gone one step further - towards something immoral.”

In one section of Kijak’s film, the narrator, actress Sara Kestel-man, says: “Scott Walker the singer still existed, going through the motions and singing other people’s songs. Scott Walker the writer was in exile.” In the BBC film, Yentob lifts this section word for word for his own commentary.

Elsewhere, Kijak’s film states: “Four albums recorded in just three years, middle-of-the-road standards by Bacharach and Mancini sit strangely next to Brel numbers about gonorrhoea and death.” Again, Yentob’s script is identical.

The quotes used from many of those interviewed in the film such as Jarvis Cocker, David Bowie and Lulu are identical in Yentob’s programme, and are played in very similar sequences. Yentob’s introduction to the programme and his commentary throughout the BBC film gave some viewers the impression he had conducted the interviews.

In 30 Century Man, there are a number of occasions when Kijak speaks off camera to Walker, who lives in Chiswick, west London, near the BBC’s television headquarters.

Several of these interactions - which make it clear Kijak conducted the coveted interview with Scott - were edited out for the BBC version.

Kijak said Yentob’s version had brought his film to a wider audience despite the dismay of some of his fans. He wrote online: “Some have told me it appeared that he was ‘passing the film off as his own’ - well, this is sort of how TV works in some instances.”

Kijak was given a credit at the end of the BBC film as a co-director while Yentob was credited as its presenter and joint executive producer. There was also a promotion for the cinematic and DVD release of 30 Century Man.

The BBC said last week that those who criticised Yentob did not understand the agreement between the BBC and the producers of the original film. “Imagine was made with their full cooperation. There is no question of any deception or underhanded-ness in what was done.

“The BBC in conjunction with the film’s producers made a shortened version for broadcast on television as part of Imagine and therefore things had to be changed, like commentary revoiced, but it was made with the full approval of the film’s original producers.”

This weekend the BBC faced criticism over its redundancy plan from David Dimbleby, chairman of Question Time, who said: “It is a false economy to cut news and current affairs even though they are expensive. They are at the very heart of the BBC. The residual support for the BBC depends on the high quality of its news and current affairs.”

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