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

The celebrated actress Prunella Scales, who passed away at 93 years old, was regarded as one of Britain's finest comic actors.

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

It was Sybil's mission throughout her existence to keep tabs on her "stick insect" husband Basil - played by John Cleese - amid cigarette-fuelled phone conversations with her friend, Audrey.

It fell to her to calm visitors who had been yelled at, totally ignored or, occasionally, throttled by Basil when during his particularly frenzied episodes.

Her unforgettable cackle, gravity-defying hairdo and intense anger were components of a meticulously crafted persona that ranks as a humorous triumph.

And while many actors would have removed themselves from excessive identification with a single role, Scales consistently voiced her delight in having been part of the Fawlty Towers experience.

Formative Years and Professional Start

Prunella Margaret Rumney Illingworth was born near Guildford on June 22nd, 1932.

She belonged to a household profoundly passionate about the theatre - her mother being, Bim Scales, a former actor who'd given it all up for family life.

Intelligent and studious, following evacuation during the war to the Lake District, Prunella attended Moira House Girls School in Eastbourne.

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

This was to the fury of her former headmistress in her hometown, who had wished she would seek admission to Cambridge and sent correspondence to the theater to tell them so.

At drama school, Scales had been thought of as a junior character actor rather than a natural Juliet candidate.

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

The youthful Prunella concealed her middle-class roots, aware that producers started seeking authentic working-class realism in their actors.

Nevertheless she began acquiring minor parts in theatrical productions, and, while rehearsing for a part at the Connaught Theatre in Worthing, she encountered Andrew Sachs, who would later star as Manuel the Spanish server, in Fawlty Towers.

Her initial television exposure occurred in 1952, as the character Lydia Bennet in a BBC production of Pride and Prejudice, which included actor Peter Cushing - more famous for his horror film performances - as Mr Darcy.

And her first big screen roles followed the next year - in romantic comedy, Laxdale Hall, and David Lean's Hobson's Choice, alongside Charles Laughton.

During the late 1950s and early 1960s, she was rarely out of work - appearing on stage, film and television, including a brief stint as transport worker, character Eileen Hughes, in the popular soap Coronation Street.

She also met colleague Timothy West.

Following what she characterized as "a mild Times crossword and Polo mints flirtation", they got together, and wed in 1963.

Breakthrough and Iconic Roles

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

Scales performed alongside actor Richard Briers, then one of the biggest stars in television comedy. The show proved hugely popular and ran for five years.

Subsequently arrived Fawlty Towers, which propelled her to iconic status.

John Cleese and his spouse at the time, Connie Booth, had submitted the first script of their comedy creation to the broadcasting corporation.

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

She later remembered that Cleese maintained high standards.

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

Merely twelve installments were ever made.

The first series, which aired in 1975, didn't immediately attract massive viewership but, with subsequent episodes, its hilarious mix of ridiculous physical comedy and awkward circumstances increased in appeal.

Scales carefully considered about how to play Sybil Fawlty, and determined that her social background had to be inferior to her husband Basil's.

Initially, John Cleese and his wife were unsure about this approach.

"Once they heard the first reading in rehearsal," recalled Scales, "they were sold on the idea."

In subsequent years, she was, all too often, called upon to play stern matriarchs when she desired elegant characters.

However when questioned about her career pinnacle, Scales had no hesitation in selecting Sybil Fawlty.

"It was a tough job," she maintained, "yet I remain proud of my work." She even thought it helped get audience members into theaters.

"I believe that audience familiarity with one performance encourages attendance at others," she expressed.

Subsequent Work and Private World

After Fawlty Towers, Scales continued to work in television, including a stint as the frumpy Elizabeth Mapp in the series Mapp and Lucia.

Her voice was also regularly heard on audio broadcasts, notably the comedy program After Henry, which subsequently transferred to television, and Ladies of Letters, with actress Patricia Routledge, which evolved into a staple of the program Woman's Hour.

Scales appeared in two significant royal characters; as Queen Elizabeth II 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 once received a letter from a royal protection officer who confessed that when Scales came on stage, he rose to his feet.

"It was a knee-jerk reaction," she clarified. "The experience delighted me."

During 1995, she started appearing as character Dotty Turnbull in television commercials for the retail chain Tesco - which paid her partly in vouchers.

The advertising series, which ran for nine years, was cited as the biggest factor in establishing its dominant market position in the mid-nineties.

Scales subsequently faced some gentle criticism for participating in the Tesco adverts, when she supported an initiative to prevent neighborhood store closures in her area of London.

Among her most accomplished roles appeared in the production Breaking the Code, the movie concerning the Bletchley Park wartime codebreakers.

She portrays Alan Turing's mother, who represents a culture that treated homosexual acts as a crime, a perspective that contributed to his tragic end.

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