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 comic actors.

Although a long and distinguished professional journey across theater and film, her legacy will forever be linked as the unforgettable Sybil Fawlty in the 1970s TV comedy, Fawlty Towers.

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

She was tasked to placate guests who had been yelled at, totally ignored or, in some cases, throttled by Basil when during his particularly frenzied episodes.

Her nightmarish laugh, gravity-defying hairdo and intense anger were part of a carefully constructed character that ranks as a comic masterpiece.

Although numerous performers would have removed themselves from too close an association with a single role, 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 was born near Guildford on June 22nd, 1932.

It was a family deeply in love with theatrical arts - her mother being, Catherine Scales, a former actor who'd given it all up for family life.

Bright and bookish, after wartime evacuation to the Lake District, Prunella attended Moira House educational institution in Eastbourne.

In 1949, she won a scholarship to the Old Vic Theatre School and - after two years - secured a position as an assistant stage manager.

This was to the fury of her former headmistress in Eastbourne, who had hoped she would apply to Cambridge and sent correspondence to the theater to express this opinion.

During her theatrical training, Scales had been thought of 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 directors were beginning to look for a new kind of earthy credibility in performers.

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

Her initial television exposure occurred in 1952, as Lydia Bennet in a BBC production of Pride and Prejudice, which included Peter Cushing - more famous for his roles in horror movies - as Mr. Darcy.

Her initial film appearances followed the next year - in lighthearted romance, the film Laxdale Hall, and David Lean's Hobson's Choice, alongside Charles Laughton.

Throughout the late 1950s and early 1960s, she maintained constant employment - performing across multiple mediums, including a brief stint as transport worker, character Eileen Hughes, in Coronation Street.

She also met 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 Marriage Lines, a BBC sitcom about a newly married couple, George and Kate Starling.

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

Subsequently arrived 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 broadcasting corporation.

Performer Bridget Turner had been approached to play the Sybil role but she declined the part and Scales tried out for the character.

She subsequently recalled 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, didn't immediately attract massive viewership but, as it continued, its comedic combination of absurd pratfalls and awkward circumstances grew in popularity.

Scales carefully considered about portraying Sybil Fawlty, and determined that her social background had to be inferior to her husband Basil's.

At first, John Cleese and his wife had doubts regarding this approach.

"After witnessing the initial read-through," recalled Scales, "they were sold on the idea."

In subsequent years, she frequently found herself, called upon to play stern matriarchs when she hankered after more glamorous roles.

However when questioned about her career pinnacle, Scales immediately identified in picking Sybil Fawlty.

"It was a tough job," she insisted, "but I'm still proud of it." 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

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

Her voice was also regularly heard on radio, particularly the comedy program After Henry, which subsequently transferred to television, and the series Ladies of Letters, with Patricia Routledge, which became an intrinsic part of the program Woman's Hour.

Scales performed two significant royal characters; as Queen Elizabeth II in the television drama of Alan Bennett's work, and as Queen Victoria in a one-woman show that she performed 400 times.

She once received a letter from one of Queen Elizabeth's security men who admitted that when Scales appeared, he stood up.

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

In 1995, she started appearing as character 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 identified as the biggest factor in establishing its dominant market position in the mid 1990s.

Scales later came in for moderate critique for taking part in the commercial campaign, when she backed a campaign to stop local shops closing in her area of London.

Among her most accomplished roles appeared in 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.

Away from acting, {Scales was