Prunella Scales: Beginning with the Iconic Fawlty Towers to Remarkable Canal Adventures

Prunella Scales, who died at the age of 93, 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 1970s TV comedy, Fawlty Towers.

Sybil's primary objective throughout her existence to keep tabs on her "stick insect" husband Basil - played by comedian John Cleese - between telephone chats fueled by cigarettes with her friend, Audrey.

It fell to her to calm visitors who had been shouted at, completely overlooked or, in some cases, throttled by Basil when in one of his more manic moods.

Her nightmarish laugh, extraordinary hairstyle and ferocious temper were components of a carefully constructed character that stands as a comic masterpiece.

And while many actors would have distanced themselves from too close an association with a single role, Scales always expressed her pleasure in having been part of the Fawlty Towers phenomenon.

Formative Years and Professional Start

Prunella Margaret Rumney Illingworth came into the world in the Guildford area on June 22nd, 1932.

She belonged to a household deeply in love with theatrical arts - with her mother, Catherine Scales, a former actor who'd abandoned her career for marriage and children.

Intelligent and studious, after wartime evacuation to England's Lake District, Prunella attended Moira House educational institution in 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 was to the fury of her former headmistress in her hometown, who had wished she would seek admission to Cambridge University and sent correspondence to the theater to tell them so.

During her theatrical training, Scales was perceived as a junior character actor instead of a natural Juliet candidate.

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

The youthful Prunella concealed her middle-class roots, conscious that producers started seeking a new kind of earthy credibility in their actors.

Nevertheless she began acquiring small roles in theatrical productions, and, during preparations for a part at Worthing's Connaught Theatre, she encountered Andrew Sachs, who would later star as Manuel, the Spanish waiter, in the famous series.

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

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

During the latter 1950s and early 1960s, she was rarely out of work - performing across multiple mediums, including a short appearance as a bus conductor, Eileen Hughes, in the popular soap Coronation Street.

She additionally encountered colleague Timothy West.

After what Prunella described as "a mild Times crossword and Polo mints flirtation", they became a couple, and wed in 1963.

Career Milestones and Defining Characters

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

Scales appeared opposite Richard Briers, then one of the biggest stars in TV humor. The show proved hugely popular and ran for five years.

Then came the legendary 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 BBC.

Actress Bridget Turner had been considered for the Sybil role but she had turned it down and Scales tried out for the character.

She later remembered that Cleese maintained high standards.

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

Only 12 episodes were ultimately produced.

The initial season, which debuted in 1975, failed to win huge audiences but, with subsequent episodes, its hilarious mix of absurd pratfalls and embarrassing situations grew in popularity.

Scales thought hard about portraying Sybil Fawlty, and decided that her character's upbringing had to be below her husband Basil's.

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

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

In subsequent years, she frequently found herself, requested to portray "dragons" and "old bags" when she desired more glamorous roles.

But when asked about what she thought was the high point, Scales had no hesitation in picking Sybil Fawlty.

"The role presented challenges," she insisted, "but I'm still proud of it." She even thought it helped get the paying public into theaters.

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

Later Career and Personal Life

Following Fawlty Towers, Scales maintained her career in the television industry, comprising an engagement as character Elizabeth Mapp in ITV's Mapp and Lucia.

Her vocal talents were frequently featured on radio, notably the comedy program After Henry, which later transitioned to TV, and the series Ladies of Letters, with actress Patricia Routledge, which became an intrinsic part of 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 solo performance 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 stood up.

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

During 1995, she started appearing as Dotty Turnbull in television commercials for supermarket giant 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 participating in the commercial campaign, 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 film about World War II cryptanalysts.

She portrays Alan Turing's mother, who represents a culture that criminalized same-sex relationships, a perspective that contributed to his tragic end.

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