It will present more than 15 new operas, including an adaptation of Iain Banks' cult novel, The Wasp Factory.

BBC: Royal Opera House announces contemporary projects

The money will be used to present a new series of contemporary operas - including Getty's Usher House - to be performed in the UK for the first time.

BBC: Opera boss defends Getty production after donation

His broadcaster, Venevision, had been tangling so much with President Hugo Chavez that Cisneros had decided to avoid politics and focus instead on entertainment content, including hugely popular Latin American soap operas.

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Mr Pountney, who joined WNO in 2011, has worked on operas by Polish artists including Karol Szymanowski's King Roger, Mieczyslaw Weinberg's The Passenger and the forthcoming premiere of Andre Tchaikowsky's The Merchant of Venice.

BBC: Welsh National Opera boss awarded for promoting Poland

Daytime TV, including live talk shows such as "The View" and soap operas, which typically tape about a week's worth of shows in advance, would be next to feel the impact.

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So far, this was the lowest point the machine had reached in my opinion (including the malfunction where it stopped moving entirely) and I hope it will not go any lower in the following operas.

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