The Legendary Prunella Scales: From Fawlty Towers to Great Canal Journeys

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

Despite an extensive and respected professional journey across theater and film, her legacy will forever be linked as the unforgettable Sybil Fawlty in the 1970s TV comedy, Fawlty Towers.

Sybil's primary objective throughout her existence to keep tabs on her husband Basil described as a "stick insect" - portrayed by comedian John Cleese - amid telephone chats fueled by cigarettes with her friend, Audrey.

It fell to her to calm visitors who had been yelled at, completely overlooked or, in some cases, throttled by Basil when during his particularly frenzied episodes.

Her unforgettable cackle, extraordinary hairstyle and intense anger were part of a meticulously crafted persona that stands as a comic masterpiece.

Although numerous performers would have distanced themselves from too close an association with one particular character, Scales always expressed her pleasure in participating of the Fawlty Towers phenomenon.

Early Life and Career Beginnings

The actress born Prunella Margaret Rumney Illingworth was born near Guildford on 22 June 1932.

It was a family profoundly passionate about the theatre - her mother being, Bim Scales, a former actor who'd abandoned her career for marriage and children.

Bright and bookish, following evacuation during the war to England's Lake District, Prunella attended Moira House Girls School in the coastal town of Eastbourne.

During 1949, she earned a scholarship to the Old Vic Theatre School and - two years later - obtained a role as a stage management assistant.

This decision angered of her previous school principal in Eastbourne, who had wished she would seek admission to Cambridge and sent correspondence to the theater to express this opinion.

During her theatrical training, Scales had been thought of as a developing character performer rather than an obvious Juliet.

"We all wanted to look like Audrey Hepburn," she subsequently informed her chronicler, "but I wasn't attractive and nobody fancied me."

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

But she started picking up small roles in plays, and, while rehearsing for a part at the Connaught Theatre in Worthing, she met Andrew Sachs, who would later star as Manuel the Spanish server, in Fawlty Towers.

Her initial television exposure occurred in the year 1952, as Lydia Bennet in a BBC production of Pride and Prejudice, which featured Peter Cushing - better known for his horror film performances - as Mr Darcy.

Her initial film appearances came a year later - in lighthearted romance, Laxdale Hall, and David Lean's production Hobson's Choice, alongside the renowned Charles Laughton.

During the latter 1950s and early 1960s, she maintained constant employment - performing across multiple mediums, featuring a short appearance as transport worker, character Eileen Hughes, in Coronation Street.

She additionally encountered colleague Timothy West.

After what Prunella described as "a gentle courtship involving crosswords and candies", they became a couple, and married in 1963.

Breakthrough and Iconic Roles

Her big TV break came with Marriage Lines, a comedy program about recentlyweds, the Starling couple.

Scales performed alongside actor Richard Briers, at that time a major celebrity in TV humor. The program achieved great success and ran for five years.

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

John Cleese and his then wife, Connie Booth, had submitted the first script of Fawlty Towers to the BBC.

Performer Bridget Turner had been approached to play the Sybil role but she had turned it down and Scales tried out for the character.

She subsequently recalled that Cleese was a hard taskmaster.

"John, appropriately, demanded strict script adherence, and failure to comply would understandably provoke his irritation."

Only 12 episodes were ultimately produced.

The first series, which debuted in 1975, failed to win huge audiences but, as it continued, its comedic combination of ridiculous physical comedy and awkward circumstances increased in appeal.

Scales carefully considered about portraying Sybil Fawlty, and determined that her character's upbringing had to be inferior to her husband Basil's.

Initially, the creators were unsure about 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, requested to portray stern matriarchs when she desired elegant characters.

But when asked about her career pinnacle, Scales had no hesitation in picking Sybil Fawlty.

"It was a tough job," she insisted, "yet I remain proud of my work." She believed it helped get audience members into performance venues.

"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

After Fawlty Towers, Scales continued to work in the television industry, comprising an engagement as the frumpy Elizabeth Mapp in ITV's Mapp and Lucia.

Her vocal talents were frequently featured on audio broadcasts, notably the comedy program After Henry, which subsequently transferred to television, and Ladies of Letters, with actress Patricia Routledge, which became an intrinsic part of Woman's Hour.

Scales performed at two major royal roles; as Queen Elizabeth in the BBC production of Alan Bennett's A Question of Attribution, and as the monarch Queen Victoria in a solo performance that she performed 400 times.

She obtained correspondence from a royal protection officer who confessed that when Scales appeared, he stood up.

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

In 1995, she began starring as character Dotty Turnbull in a series of TV adverts for supermarket giant 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 some gentle criticism for taking part in the commercial campaign, when she backed a campaign to prevent neighborhood store closures in her area of London.

Among her most accomplished roles came in the production Breaking the Code, the film about the Bletchley Park wartime codebreakers.

She portrays 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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