Prunella Scales: From Fawlty Towers to Great Canal Journeys

Prunella Scales, who died at the age of 93, was regarded as among Britain's most brilliant comic actors.

Despite an extensive and respected professional journey across theater and film, her legacy will forever be linked as Sybil Fawlty in the classic 1970s television series, Fawlty Towers.

It was Sybil's mission in life to keep tabs on her husband Basil described as a "stick insect" - played by comedian John Cleese - between cigarette-fuelled phone conversations with her friend, Audrey.

She was tasked to calm visitors who had been shouted at, completely overlooked or, occasionally, physically confronted by Basil when in one of his more manic moods.

Her nightmarish laugh, gravity-defying hairdo and ferocious temper were components of a meticulously crafted persona that ranks as a comic masterpiece.

And while many actors would have removed themselves from too close an association with a single role, Scales consistently voiced her delight in having been part of the Fawlty Towers phenomenon.

Formative Years and Professional Start

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

It was a family deeply in love with the theatre - her mother being, Bim Scales, a former actor who'd abandoned her career for family life.

Intelligent and studious, after wartime evacuation to the Lake District, Prunella studied at Moira House Girls School in Eastbourne.

During 1949, she won a scholarship to the Old Vic Theatre School and - two years later - obtained a role as a stage management assistant.

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

During her theatrical training, Scales had been thought of as a junior character actor instead of an obvious Juliet.

"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 privileged background, aware that producers started seeking a new kind of earthy credibility in their actors.

But she started picking up minor parts in theatrical productions, and, while rehearsing for a part at the Connaught Theatre in Worthing, she encountered actor Andrew Sachs, who would subsequently appear as Manuel, the Spanish waiter, in the famous series.

Her initial television exposure occurred in the year 1952, as Lydia Bennet in a television adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, which included actor Peter Cushing - more famous for his horror film performances - as Mr Darcy.

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

Throughout the latter 1950s and early 1960s, she was rarely out of work - appearing on stage, film and television, including a short appearance as a bus conductor, Eileen Hughes, in Coronation Street.

She also met colleague Timothy West.

Following what she characterized as "a gentle courtship involving crosswords and candies", they got together, and married in 1963.

Career Milestones and Defining Characters

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

Scales performed alongside Richard Briers, at that time a major celebrity in TV humor. The program achieved great success and continued for five seasons.

Subsequently arrived 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 broadcasting corporation.

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

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 ever made.

The initial season, which debuted in 1975, failed to win huge audiences but, with subsequent episodes, its comedic combination of ridiculous physical comedy and awkward circumstances grew in popularity.

Scales carefully considered about how to play Sybil Fawlty, and determined that her character's upbringing had to be below her husband Basil's.

Initially, the creators were unsure about the treatment.

"Once they heard the first reading in rehearsal," Scales remembered, "they were sold on the idea."

Later in her career, she was, all too often, requested to portray "dragons" and "old bags" when she hankered after elegant characters.

However when questioned 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 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.

Later Career and Personal Life

After Fawlty Towers, Scales continued to work in the television industry, comprising a stint as character Elizabeth Mapp in the series Mapp and Lucia.

Her voice was also regularly heard on radio, particularly the BBC Radio 4 sitcom, which later transitioned to TV, and the series Ladies of Letters, with Patricia Routledge, which evolved into a staple of Woman's Hour.

Scales performed two significant royal characters; as Queen Elizabeth II in the BBC production of Alan Bennett's A Question of Attribution, and as the monarch Queen Victoria in a one-woman show that she performed 400 times.

She once received a letter from a royal protection officer who admitted that when Scales appeared, he rose to his feet.

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

During 1995, she began starring as Dotty Turnbull in television commercials for supermarket giant 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 1990s.

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

One of her finest performances came in Breaking the Code, the movie concerning World War II cryptanalysts.

She appears as Alan Turing's mother, who embodies a society that criminalized same-sex relationships, an attitude that eventually led to his death.

Beyond performance, {Scales was