The Legendary Prunella Scales: From Fawlty Towers to Remarkable Canal Adventures

Prunella Scales, who died at 93 years old, was considered among Britain's most brilliant comedic performers.

Despite an extensive and respected career on stage and screen, her legacy will forever be linked as Sybil Fawlty in the classic 1970s television series, Fawlty Towers.

Sybil's primary objective in life to keep tabs on her "stick insect" husband Basil - portrayed by comedian John Cleese - between cigarette-fuelled phone conversations with her companion Audrey.

She was tasked to placate guests who had been shouted at, completely overlooked or, occasionally, throttled by Basil when in one of his more manic moods.

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

And while numerous performers would have removed themselves from too close an association with one particular character, Scales consistently voiced her pleasure in having been part of the Fawlty Towers experience.

Early Life and Career Beginnings

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

It was a family deeply in love with the theatre - with her mother, Catherine Scales, a former actor who'd abandoned her career for marriage and children.

Bright and bookish, after wartime evacuation to England's Lake District, Prunella attended Moira House Girls School in Eastbourne.

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

This was to the fury of her previous school principal in Eastbourne, who had hoped she would apply to Cambridge University and sent correspondence to the theater to express this opinion.

At drama school, Scales was perceived as a developing character performer instead of an obvious Juliet.

"Everyone aspired to resemble Audrey Hepburn," she subsequently informed her chronicler, "however I lacked conventional beauty and attracted no admirers."

Young Prunella also hid her middle-class roots, conscious that directors were beginning to look for authentic working-class realism in their actors.

Nevertheless she began acquiring small roles in plays, and, while rehearsing for a part at the Connaught Theatre in Worthing, she met Andrew Sachs, who would subsequently appear as Manuel, the Spanish waiter, in the famous series.

There was an early television appearance in 1952, as the character Lydia Bennet in a television adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, which featured Peter Cushing - better known for his roles in horror movies - as Mr Darcy.

And her first big screen roles came a year later - in romantic comedy, Laxdale Hall, and David Lean's Hobson's Choice, opposite the renowned Charles Laughton.

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

She also met fellow actor Timothy West.

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

Breakthrough and Iconic Roles

Her major television opportunity arrived through the series Marriage Lines, a BBC sitcom about recentlyweds, George and Kate Starling.

Scales appeared opposite actor Richard Briers, at that time a major celebrity in television comedy. The program achieved great success and ran for five years.

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

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

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

She subsequently recalled that Cleese was a hard taskmaster.

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

Merely twelve installments were ultimately produced.

The first series, which debuted in 1975, didn't immediately attract massive viewership but, with subsequent episodes, its comedic combination of absurd pratfalls and embarrassing situations grew in popularity.

Scales thought hard about portraying Sybil Fawlty, and determined that her social background had to be inferior to her husband Basil's.

At first, the creators had doubts regarding the treatment.

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

Later in her career, she frequently found herself, called upon to play stern matriarchs when she desired more glamorous roles.

However when questioned about her career pinnacle, Scales immediately identified in selecting Sybil Fawlty.

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

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

Later Career and Personal Life

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

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

Scales performed two significant royal characters; as Queen Elizabeth in the television drama of Alan Bennett's work, and as the monarch Queen Victoria in a one-woman show that she performed 400 times.

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

"The response was automatic," she clarified. "I was thrilled."

In 1995, she began starring as Dotty Turnbull in television commercials for supermarket giant Tesco - which paid her partly in vouchers.

The campaign, which ran for nine years, was identified as the primary reason in propelling it to market leadership in the mid-nineties.

Scales subsequently faced moderate critique for participating 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 Alan Turing's mother, who represents a culture that treated homosexual acts as a crime, an attitude that eventually led to his death.

Beyond performance, {Scales was