The Legendary Prunella Scales: Beginning with the Iconic Fawlty Towers to Great Canal Journeys

The celebrated actress Prunella Scales, who passed away at the age of 93, 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 classic 1970s television series, Fawlty Towers.

It was Sybil's mission throughout her existence to closely monitor her husband Basil described as a "stick insect" - portrayed by John Cleese - amid telephone chats fueled by cigarettes with her friend, Audrey.

She was tasked to calm visitors who had been shouted at, totally ignored or, in some cases, throttled by Basil when in one of his more manic moods.

Her unforgettable cackle, extraordinary hairstyle and intense anger were components of a meticulously crafted persona that stands as a humorous triumph.

And while many actors would have distanced themselves from excessive identification with one particular character, Scales always expressed her delight in having been part of the Fawlty Towers experience.

Formative Years and Professional Start

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

She belonged to a household deeply in love with theatrical arts - her mother being, Catherine Scales, a former actor who'd given it all up for marriage and children.

Intelligent and studious, following evacuation during the war to the Lake District, Prunella studied at Moira House educational institution in the coastal town of Eastbourne.

During 1949, she earned a scholarship to the Old Vic Theatre School and - after two years - secured a position as a stage management assistant.

This was to the fury of her former headmistress 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 was perceived as a developing character performer instead of an obvious Juliet.

"We all wanted to look like Audrey Hepburn," she later told her biographer, "however I lacked conventional beauty and attracted no admirers."

Young Prunella also hid her privileged background, conscious 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 part at Worthing's Connaught Theatre, she met actor Andrew Sachs, who would later star as Manuel the Spanish server, in Fawlty Towers.

There was an early television appearance in 1952, as Lydia Bennet in a BBC production of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, which included Peter Cushing - better known for his roles in horror movies - as Mr Darcy.

And her first big screen roles followed the next year - in lighthearted romance, the film Laxdale Hall, and David Lean's production Hobson's Choice, alongside the renowned Charles Laughton.

Throughout the latter 1950s and early 1960s, she maintained constant employment - appearing on stage, film and television, including a short appearance as transport worker, Eileen Hughes, in the popular soap Coronation Street.

She additionally encountered colleague Timothy West.

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

Career Milestones and Defining Characters

Her big TV break came with Marriage Lines, a BBC sitcom about recentlyweds, George and Kate Starling.

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

Subsequently arrived 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 Sybil Fawlty 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 ultimately produced.

The first series, which debuted in 1975, failed to win huge audiences but, as it continued, its hilarious mix of absurd pratfalls and awkward circumstances grew in popularity.

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

Initially, the creators were unsure about the treatment.

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

In subsequent years, she frequently found herself, called upon to play stern matriarchs when she desired elegant characters.

But when asked about her career pinnacle, Scales immediately identified in picking Sybil Fawlty.

"The role presented challenges," she maintained, "yet I remain proud of my work." She even thought it helped get audience members into performance venues.

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

Subsequent Work and Private World

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

Her vocal talents were frequently featured on radio, particularly the comedy program After Henry, which subsequently transferred to television, and the series 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 in the BBC production of Alan Bennett's A Question of Attribution, and as Queen Victoria in a one-woman show that she presented four hundred times.

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

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

During 1995, she started appearing as character Dotty Turnbull in a series of TV adverts for supermarket giant Tesco - which compensated her partially with shopping credits.

The campaign, which continued 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 area of London.

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

She portrays the mother of Alan Turing, who embodies a society that treated homosexual acts as a crime, an attitude that eventually led to his death.

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