Todor Zhivkov to 1988, Bulgaria won an unprecedented 153 Olympic medals and numerous European and world competitions in sports as diverse as volleyball, rhythmic gymnastics and wrestling. Dissent was punished under Zhivkov's rule. The CSS was a feared tool of control, and overt opposition largely stayed underground until the late 1980s. In 1978, the Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov was assassinated in London by an agent who stabbed him with an umbrella tip which implanted a very small ricin ball. According to former KGB general Oleg Kalugin, this was requested by Zhivkov and either performed by the KGB or it assisted the CSS;
Death on the Nile (1978 film) pythons. Cinematographer Jack Cardiff says he and Guillermin decided to give the film "an old fashioned 30s look". The choreography for the tango scene was provided by British dancer Wayne Sleep. In early 1978 David Niven's daughter was seriously injured in a car accident. Niven would fly from London to Switzerland on weekends during filming to sit by her bedside. Although it was a British film, "Death on the Nile" first premiered in New York, on 29 September 1978, to coincide with the sale of tickets for the Metropolitan Museum of Art's opening on 15 December 1978 of the travelling