"Television Opera - that is, opera commissioned for television - was one of the earliest attempts by television to bridge the distinction between high culture and popular culture: between 1951 and 2002, in Britain and the United States, over fifty operas were commissioned for television." "This book contrasts the buoyant initial intentions of television's policy makers and creative advisers with the subsequent inability (for various reasons) to deliver as intended. The decline in the relationship between television and its commissioned operas is charted through three case studies: Menotti's Amahl and the Night Visitors (NBC), Britten's Owen Wingrave (BBC), and Gerald Barry's The Triumph of Beauty and Deceit (Channel 4) - the first a live broadcast, the second a video recording, and the third a filmed opera made for television."--Jacket.