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

The celebrated actress Prunella Scales, who died at the age of 93, was regarded as one of Britain's finest comedic performers.

Despite a long and distinguished career on stage and screen, she will inevitably be remembered as the unforgettable Sybil Fawlty in the 1970s TV comedy, the beloved Fawlty Towers.

Sybil's primary objective throughout her existence to closely monitor her husband Basil described as a "stick insect" - played by John Cleese - amid cigarette-fuelled phone conversations with her friend, Audrey.

It fell to her to calm visitors who had been shouted at, totally ignored or, in some cases, physically confronted by Basil when in one of his more manic moods.

Her nightmarish laugh, gravity-defying hairdo and ferocious temper were part of a carefully constructed character that stands as a humorous triumph.

Although numerous performers 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 deeply in love with theatrical arts - her mother being, Bim Scales, an ex-actress who'd given it all up for marriage and children.

Intelligent and studious, after wartime evacuation to England's Lake District, Prunella attended Moira House educational institution in the coastal town of Eastbourne.

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

This decision angered of her previous school principal in her hometown, who had wished she would seek admission to Cambridge University and wrote to the theatre to express this opinion.

At drama school, Scales was perceived as a junior character actor 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 concealed her middle-class roots, aware that producers started seeking a new kind of earthy credibility in their actors.

But she started picking up small roles in plays, and, during preparations for a role at Worthing's Connaught Theatre, she encountered Andrew Sachs, who would subsequently appear 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 - better known for his roles in horror movies - as Mr Darcy.

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

During the late 1950s and early 1960s, she was rarely out of work - performing across multiple mediums, featuring a brief stint as a bus conductor, character Eileen Hughes, in Coronation Street.

She additionally encountered colleague Timothy West.

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

Career Milestones and Defining Characters

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

Scales appeared opposite Richard Briers, then one of the biggest stars 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 presented the initial screenplay of Fawlty Towers to the BBC.

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 maintained high standards.

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

Only 12 episodes were ever made.

The first series, which debuted 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 thought hard about portraying Sybil Fawlty, and determined that her social background had to be inferior to Basil's social standing.

Initially, the creators had doubts regarding the treatment.

"After witnessing the initial read-through," recalled Scales, "they embraced the concept completely."

Later in her career, she was, all too often, called upon to play "dragons" and "old bags" when she desired elegant characters.

However when questioned about what she thought was the high point, Scales immediately identified in selecting Sybil Fawlty.

"It was a tough job," she maintained, "but I'm still proud of it." She even thought it helped get 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 television, comprising a stint as character Elizabeth Mapp in the series Mapp and Lucia.

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

Scales appeared in at two major royal roles; as Queen Elizabeth in the television drama of Alan Bennett's work, and as Queen Victoria in a one-woman show that she presented four hundred times.

She obtained correspondence from one of Queen Elizabeth's security men who confessed that when Scales came on stage, he rose to his feet.

"It was a knee-jerk reaction," she clarified. "I was thrilled."

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

The advertising series, which continued for nine years, was cited as the biggest factor in propelling it to market leadership in the mid-nineties.

Scales later came in for some gentle criticism for taking part in the commercial campaign, when she supported an initiative to prevent neighborhood store closures in her London community.

One of her finest performances appeared in Breaking the Code, the film about World War II cryptanalysts.

She appears as the mother of Alan Turing, who represents a culture that treated homosexual acts as a crime, an attitude that eventually led to his death.

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