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

Prunella Scales, who died at 93 years old, was regarded as among Britain's most brilliant comedic performers.

Despite a long and distinguished professional journey across theater and film, she will inevitably be remembered as the unforgettable Sybil Fawlty in the 1970s TV comedy, the beloved Fawlty Towers.

It was Sybil's mission throughout her existence to keep tabs on her husband Basil described as a "stick insect" - portrayed by comedian John Cleese - amid telephone chats fueled by cigarettes with her companion Audrey.

It fell to her to placate guests who had been shouted 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 components of a meticulously crafted persona that ranks as a humorous triumph.

And while numerous performers would have distanced themselves from excessive identification with a single role, Scales consistently voiced her delight in having been part of the Fawlty Towers phenomenon.

Early Life and Career Beginnings

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

She belonged to a household deeply in love with the theatre - with her mother, Bim Scales, a former actor who'd abandoned her career for family life.

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

During 1949, she won a scholarship to the Old Vic Theatre 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 and wrote to the theatre to express this opinion.

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

"We all wanted to look like Audrey Hepburn," she subsequently informed her biographer, "however I lacked conventional beauty and attracted no admirers."

The youthful Prunella also hid her middle-class roots, aware that directors were beginning to look for authentic working-class realism in their actors.

Nevertheless she began acquiring small roles in plays, and, while rehearsing for a part at the Connaught Theatre in Worthing, she encountered Andrew Sachs, who would later star as Manuel, the Spanish waiter, in the famous series.

Her initial television exposure occurred in 1952, as Lydia Bennet in a television adaptation of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, which included actor Peter Cushing - more famous for his roles in horror movies - as Mr Darcy.

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

Throughout the late 1950s and early 1960s, she was rarely out of work - appearing on stage, film and television, featuring a brief stint as a bus conductor, character Eileen Hughes, in the popular soap Coronation Street.

She also met fellow actor Timothy West.

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

Breakthrough and Iconic Roles

Her big TV break arrived through the series Marriage Lines, a BBC sitcom about a newly married couple, George and Kate Starling.

Scales performed alongside Richard Briers, at that time a major celebrity in television comedy. The show proved hugely popular 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 BBC.

Actress Bridget Turner had been considered for Sybil Fawlty but she declined the part and Scales tried out for the character.

She later remembered 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 ever made.

The first series, which aired in 1975, failed to win huge audiences but, with subsequent episodes, its comedic combination of ridiculous physical comedy and embarrassing situations increased in appeal.

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

Initially, John Cleese and his wife were unsure about the treatment.

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

Later in her career, she frequently found herself, called upon to play stern matriarchs when she hankered after elegant characters.

However when questioned about her career pinnacle, Scales had no hesitation in selecting Sybil Fawlty.

"The role presented challenges," she maintained, "but I'm still proud of it." She believed it assisted in bringing the paying public into theaters.

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

Subsequent Work and Private World

After Fawlty Towers, Scales maintained her career in television, including a stint as the frumpy Elizabeth Mapp in the series Mapp and Lucia.

Her vocal talents were frequently featured on audio broadcasts, notably the comedy program After Henry, which subsequently transferred to television, and the series Ladies of Letters, with actress Patricia Routledge, which evolved into a staple of the program Woman's Hour.

Scales appeared in at two major royal roles; as Queen Elizabeth II in the BBC production of Alan Bennett's work, and as the monarch Queen Victoria in a solo performance that she performed 400 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. "The experience delighted me."

During 1995, she started appearing as character Dotty Turnbull in television commercials for the retail chain Tesco - which paid her partly in vouchers.

The advertising series, which continued for nine years, was cited 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 Breaking the Code, the movie concerning the Bletchley Park wartime codebreakers.

She portrays Alan Turing's mother, who embodies a society that treated homosexual acts as a crime, an attitude that eventually led to his death.

Beyond performance, {Scales was