Prunella Scales: From the Iconic Fawlty Towers to Great Canal Journeys

The celebrated actress Prunella Scales, who passed away at the age of 93, was considered among Britain's most brilliant comic actors.

Although an extensive and respected career on stage and screen, she will inevitably be remembered as the unforgettable Sybil Fawlty in the 1970s TV comedy, Fawlty Towers.

Sybil's primary objective throughout her existence to closely monitor her husband Basil described as a "stick insect" - portrayed by comedian John Cleese - amid telephone chats fueled by cigarettes with her companion Audrey.

She was tasked to calm visitors who had been shouted at, totally ignored or, in some cases, throttled by Basil when during his particularly frenzied episodes.

Her unforgettable cackle, extraordinary hairstyle and intense anger were components of a carefully constructed character that stands as a comic masterpiece.

Although numerous performers would have removed themselves from too close an association with a single role, Scales always expressed her pleasure in having been part of the Fawlty Towers phenomenon.

Early Life and Career Beginnings

The actress born Prunella Margaret Rumney Illingworth came into the world near Guildford on June 22nd, 1932.

She belonged to a household profoundly passionate about theatrical arts - with her mother, Bim Scales, an ex-actress who'd given it all up for family life.

Intelligent and studious, after wartime evacuation to England's Lake District, Prunella studied at Moira House Girls School in the coastal town of Eastbourne.

In 1949, she earned a scholarship to the prestigious Old Vic drama school and - after two years - obtained a role as a stage management assistant.

This was to the fury of her previous school principal in Eastbourne, who had wished she would seek admission to Cambridge University and sent correspondence to the theater to tell them so.

At drama school, Scales had been thought of as a junior character actor instead of an obvious Juliet.

"Everyone aspired to resemble Audrey Hepburn," she later told her biographer, "however I lacked conventional beauty and attracted no admirers."

Young Prunella also hid her middle-class roots, aware that producers started seeking a new kind of earthy credibility in performers.

But she started picking up minor parts in plays, and, while rehearsing for a role at the Connaught Theatre in Worthing, she encountered Andrew Sachs, who would later star as Manuel, the Spanish waiter, in Fawlty Towers.

There was an early television appearance in 1952, as Lydia Bennet in a television adaptation of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, which featured Peter Cushing - more famous for his horror film performances - as Mr Darcy.

Her initial film appearances followed the next year - in lighthearted romance, Laxdale Hall, and David Lean's Hobson's Choice, alongside Charles Laughton.

Throughout the latter 1950s and early 1960s, she maintained constant employment - performing across multiple mediums, including a brief stint as transport worker, Eileen Hughes, in the popular soap Coronation Street.

She also met colleague Timothy West.

After what Prunella described as "a mild Times crossword and Polo mints flirtation", they got together, and wed in 1963.

Breakthrough and Iconic Roles

Her major television opportunity came with the series Marriage Lines, a comedy program about recentlyweds, George and Kate Starling.

Scales performed alongside Richard Briers, at that time a major celebrity in TV humor. The show proved hugely popular and continued for five seasons.

Then came the legendary Fawlty Towers, which elevated her to cultural icon.

John Cleese and his then wife, Connie Booth, had presented the initial screenplay of their comedy creation to the broadcasting corporation.

Actress Bridget Turner had been considered for the Sybil role but she declined the part and Scales auditioned for the role.

She later remembered that Cleese was a hard taskmaster.

"John, quite rightly, was extremely rigorous about learning the script, and if you didn't, he could get quite cross, which was fair enough."

Only 12 episodes were ever made.

The initial season, which aired in 1975, didn't immediately attract massive viewership but, as it continued, its hilarious mix of absurd pratfalls and embarrassing situations grew in popularity.

Scales carefully considered about portraying Sybil Fawlty, and decided that her social background had to be inferior to Basil's social standing.

At first, John Cleese and his wife had doubts regarding this approach.

"Once they heard the first reading in rehearsal," Scales remembered, "they embraced the concept completely."

Later in her career, she was, all too often, called upon to play stern matriarchs when she hankered after elegant characters.

However when questioned about what she thought was the high point, Scales had no hesitation in picking Sybil Fawlty.

"It was a tough job," she maintained, "but I'm still proud of it." She even thought it assisted in bringing the paying public into theaters.

"I like to think that if the public have seen you in one thing they'll come and see you in another," she said.

Subsequent Work and Private World

Following Fawlty Towers, Scales maintained her career in the television industry, including a stint as the frumpy Elizabeth Mapp in the series Mapp and Lucia.

Her vocal talents were frequently featured on radio, notably the BBC Radio 4 sitcom, which subsequently transferred to television, and the series Ladies of Letters, with Patricia Routledge, which evolved into a staple of Woman's Hour.

Scales performed at two major royal roles; as Queen Elizabeth in the television drama of Alan Bennett's work, and as Queen Victoria in a solo performance that she performed 400 times.

She once received a letter from one of Queen Elizabeth's security men who admitted that when Scales came on stage, he stood up.

"The response was automatic," she explained. "The experience delighted me."

In 1995, she started appearing as character Dotty Turnbull in a series of TV adverts for the retail chain Tesco - which compensated her partially with shopping credits.

The campaign, which ran for nine years, was cited as the primary reason in propelling it to market leadership in the mid 1990s.

Scales subsequently faced moderate critique for participating in the commercial campaign, when she backed a campaign to stop local shops closing in her London community.

One of her finest performances came in the production Breaking the Code, the movie concerning the Bletchley Park wartime codebreakers.

She appears as the mother of Alan Turing, who embodies a society that criminalized same-sex relationships, an attitude that eventually led to his death.

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