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 a long and distinguished 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 keep tabs on her "stick insect" husband Basil - portrayed by comedian John Cleese - amid cigarette-fuelled phone conversations with her friend, Audrey.

It fell to her to placate guests who had been yelled at, totally ignored or, in some cases, physically confronted by Basil when during his particularly frenzied episodes.

Her nightmarish laugh, extraordinary hairstyle and intense anger were components of a meticulously crafted persona that stands as a comic masterpiece.

Although numerous performers would have distanced themselves from excessive identification with one particular character, Scales always expressed her pleasure in having been part of the Fawlty Towers phenomenon.

Early Life and Career Beginnings

The actress born Prunella Margaret Rumney Illingworth came into the world near Guildford on June 22nd, 1932.

She belonged to a household deeply in love with the theatre - her mother being, Catherine Scales, an ex-actress who'd given it all up for marriage and children.

Bright and bookish, following evacuation during the war to the Lake District, Prunella attended Moira House educational institution in the coastal town of Eastbourne.

During 1949, she earned a scholarship to the prestigious Old Vic drama school and - after two years - obtained a role as a stage management assistant.

This decision angered of her former headmistress in her hometown, who had hoped she would apply to Cambridge and sent correspondence to the theater to tell them so.

During her theatrical training, Scales had been thought of as a junior character actor rather than a natural Juliet candidate.

"Everyone aspired to resemble Audrey Hepburn," she subsequently informed her biographer, "but I wasn't attractive and nobody fancied me."

Young Prunella also hid her privileged background, conscious that directors were beginning to look for authentic working-class realism in performers.

Nevertheless she began acquiring minor parts in theatrical productions, and, while rehearsing 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 the character Lydia Bennet in a BBC production of Pride and Prejudice, which included actor Peter Cushing - better known for his roles in horror movies - as Mr. Darcy.

Her initial film appearances came a year later - in romantic comedy, Laxdale Hall, and David Lean's Hobson's Choice, opposite 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 the popular soap Coronation Street.

She additionally encountered fellow actor Timothy West.

Following what she characterized as "a gentle courtship involving crosswords and candies", they became a couple, and wed in 1963.

Breakthrough and Iconic Roles

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

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

Subsequently arrived Fawlty Towers, which elevated her to cultural icon.

John Cleese and his then wife, Connie Booth, had presented the initial screenplay of their comedy creation to the BBC.

Performer Bridget Turner had been considered for the Sybil role but she had turned it down and Scales auditioned for the role.

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."

Only 12 episodes were ultimately produced.

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

Scales thought hard about how to play Sybil Fawlty, and decided that her character's upbringing had to be inferior to Basil's social standing.

Initially, the creators were unsure about the treatment.

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

In subsequent years, she was, all too often, called upon to play "dragons" and "old bags" when she hankered after elegant characters.

But when asked about her career pinnacle, 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 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 expressed.

Subsequent Work and Private World

After Fawlty Towers, Scales maintained her career in television, including 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 later transitioned to TV, and the series Ladies of Letters, with Patricia Routledge, which evolved into a staple of the program Woman's Hour.

Scales appeared in at two major royal roles; as Queen Elizabeth in the BBC production of Alan Bennett's work, 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 confessed that when Scales came on stage, he stood up.

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

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

The advertising series, which ran for nine years, was identified as the primary reason in establishing its dominant market position in the mid-nineties.

Scales later came in for moderate critique for participating in the Tesco adverts, when she supported an initiative to stop local shops closing in her area of London.

One of her finest performances appeared in the production Breaking the Code, the film about the Bletchley Park wartime codebreakers.

She appears as the mother of Alan Turing, who embodies a society that treated homosexual acts as a crime, a perspective that contributed to his tragic end.

Beyond performance, {Scales was