The BBC said she had been commissioned to do the work by Lucy Adams, the BBC's director of HR, and David Holdsworth, the controller of English Regions.

BBC: Russell Joslin death: Lesley Granger heads BBC inquiry

"Other exam boards have changed their grade boundaries, as they do most years, but it's the unprecedented scale of AQA's changes in English between the January exams and the June exams that we see as unfair, " he said.

BBC: Suffolk drops down secondary schools GCSE league table

"He's become best known for the English country look, but he can do anything, " says producer Laurence Mark (Dreamgirls, Julie and Julia), who hired Smith years ago after "falling in love" with the house he designed for the late Paramount chief Dawn Steel.

WSJ: Going Modern, Staying Grand