Actress Prunella Scales will always be remembered for playing hotel manager and fearsome wife of Basil Fawlty, Sybil, in the BBC sitcom, Fawlty Towers – a series which won the BAFTA for best scripted comedy in 1976 and shot Prunella to international fame. The actress, who was married to fellow actor Timothy West until his death in November last year, aged 90, held a wide range of film, television and theatre roles over her long-standing acting career and is regarded as one of Britain's finest comic actors. Following Prunella's death aged 93, join HELLO! as we take a look back at her glittering career in photos.
Prunella starred opposite Richard Briers in Marriage Lines
Prunella's early career
After studying at the Old Vic Theatre School and working as an assistant stage manager, Prunella landed her big break with the early 1960s sitcom, Marriage Lines, in which she starred opposite Richard Briers. After that, the actress landed a string of roles in BBC Radio 4 sitcoms, including After Henry, Smelling Of Roses and Ladies Of Letters, while on the small screen, she appeared in Channel 4's Mapp & Lucia, based on the novels by E. F. Benson, and in an episode of the comedy series, Seven of One.
Hobson's Choice is one of Prunella's first cinematic roles
Prunella's big-screen roles
As for her roles on the big screen, Prunella has an impressive list of dramas and comedies on her CV, including the 1954 rom-com, Hobson's Choice and 1992's Howards End, in which she starred opposite Emma Thompson, Anthony Hopkins, Helena Bonham Carter and her son, Samuel West. She also appeared in The Hound of the Baskervilles (1978), The Wicked Lady (1983) and The Boys From Brazil (1978).
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Meeting Timothy West
Prunella met her husband, actor Timothy West, in the BBC period television play, She Died Young, in 1961. The actress has previously described their romance as "a mild Times crossword and Polo mints flirtation". The couple, who wed in 1963, and have two sons, actor Samuel and Joseph, went on to play husband and wife, Horace and Hilda Rumpole, in four BBC Radio 4 plays in 2003.
Prunella portrayed of Sybil in the BBC comedy Fawlty Towers
Fawlty Towers
Prunella's portrayal of Sybil in the BBC comedy Fawlty Towers propelled her to worldwide fame. The actress starred opposite John Cleese, who wrote the show with his then-wife, Connie Booth. Actress Bridget Turner was first approached for the role but turned it down before Prunella auditioned.
The series ran for twelve episodes over two series from 1975 to 1979. It won three BAFTAs, including Best Scripted Comedy and Best Entertainment Performance, which went to Cleese for his portrayal of Basil Fawlty.
1. Love letters
One of the traits which first made Prunella fall in love with Timothy West was his letter writing: ''He writes lovely letters. Marvellous letters. And when we were first together, that was one of the things that fascinated me about him.'' Timothy said they would write to each other in the early stages of their relationship, sometimes two or three times a day.
2. Christening a cruise
In 2005, Prunella named a luxury P&O cruise ship, Artemis, and became its godmother.
3. Cambridge worthy
When Prunella was accepted into Bristol Old Vic Theatre School to pursue her love of acting, her headmistress wrote to the director of the school and said: ''Are you sure this girl should be an actress? We wanted her to try for Cambridge.'' Luckily, the director didn’t change his mind!
4. Spoken word
As an established actress, Prunella spoke passionately about her love of the spoken word and once revealed she even encouraged schoolchildren to read Pride and Prejudice aloud: ''The text came alive, and you saw an irony in the writing that you simply couldn’t see on the page.''
5. Dotty's days at Tesco
One of Prunella's acting roles was as the character Dotty in a series of adverts for the supermarket chain Tesco from 1995 to 2004. Dotty was a demanding, eccentric character who always put Tesco store initiatives to the test, and her daughter Kate was played by Jane Horrocks (Absolutely Fabulous).
Prunella as Queen Victoria in Queen Victoria - An Evening at Osborne
Prunella's theatre career
Prunella's career started on the stage, where she picked up various small roles before landing her big break. Later on in her career, she starred in a one-woman show called An Evening With Queen Victoria, which she performed in theatres around the world on and off until 2007.
Prunella also starred in a production of Carrie's War, the Nina Bawden novel, at the Apollo Theatre in 2009.
Prunella played Queen Elizabeth in A Question of Attribution
Prunella's other notable roles and later years
Some of Prunella's other major on-screen roles include her portrayal of Queen Elizabeth in the 1991 BBC production of Alan Bennett's A Question of Attribution, and the 2006 miniseries, The Shell Seekers, in which she starred alongside Academy Award winners Vanessa Redgrave and Maximilian Schell.
In her later years, Prunella, who was diagnosed with vascular dementia in 2013, appeared alongside her husband Timothy in ten seasons of the Channel 4 documentary, Great Canal Journeys. The show ran from 2014 until 2020, when Prunella's dementia reportedly progressed to the point where they couldn't continue.