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Prunella Scales, English actor best known for playing Sybil Fawlty acclaimed sitcom Faulty TowersHas died at the age of 93.
The actor “passed away peacefully at home in London yesterday”, his sons Samuel and Joseph said in a statement, adding that their mother was watching Faulty Towers the day before his death,
“Our Dear Mother Prunella Scales Died peacefully at home in London yesterday. She was 93 years old. Although dementia forced her to retire from a remarkable acting career spanning nearly 70 years, she remained at home.
“We would like to thank everyone who gave Prue such wonderful care at the end of her life: her final days were comfortable, content and surrounded by love.”
Scales came to fame as the overbearing wife of John Cleese’s eccentric hotelier, Basil Fawlty, in two seasons of the BAFTA-winning comedy series between 1975 and 1979.
Cleese described her former co-star as “a really wonderful comedic actress”, adding: “Scene after scene she was absolutely perfect.”
As Sybil, Scales cemented her career as the queen of British television sitcoms with her big hair, high heels, vicious laugh and imperious presence. Set in a quaint hotel in Torquay, Devon, Faulty Towers Follows the efforts of the dysfunctional management team to run the hotel as they face demanding guests and absurd situations.
Scales also played Alan Bennett’s scheming Queen Elizabeth II, on stage and then on television. Question of attributionFor which he was nominated for a BAFTA TV Award.
John Petrie, director of comedy at the BBC, remembered Scales as a “national treasure” whose talent as Sybil Fawlty shone on the screen and still makes us laugh today.
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Broadcaster Gilles Brandreth remembered Prunella Scales as “a funny, intelligent, interesting, talented human being”. Sharing some photos of the actress on
Corinne Mills, interim chief executive of the Alzheimer’s Society, praised Scales for raising awareness of dementia, which she was honored with in 2013.
Mills said, “Prunella was an inspiration not only for her achievements on screen, but also because she spoke openly about living with dementia and shed vital light on Britain’s biggest killer.”
Born Prunella Margaret Rumney Illingworth in 1932 to actress Katherine Scales and Army Lieutenant John Richardson Illingworth, Scales was educated, thanks to a scholarship, at Moira House Girls’ School, Eastbourne, where her mother got a job as an under-matron. Scales went straight to drama school instead of university, attending the Old Vic in London with another scholarship, and then trained under Uta Hagen at the Herbert Berghof Studio in New York.
Scales began his career as an assistant stage manager at the Bristol Old Vic in 1951, before turning his attention to stage and screen roles.
The break in his career came in the early sixties with the sitcom marriage linesStarring Richard Briers as a newlywed couple who are bored with domestic life.
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After the success of Faulty TowersScales worked with Geraldine McEwan and Nigel Hawthorne for television adaptations of E.F. Benson’s stories. Map and Luciawhich aired on ITV between 1985 and 1986. As Miss Elizabeth Mapp, Scales played a snobby socialite who ran the social life in the fictional town of Tilling-on-Sea.
Scales met her husband of 61 years, Late actor Timothy WestDuring the shooting of a BBC television drama She died young, In 1961. The couple married in 1963, and have two sons, actors Samuel West and Joseph West. Timothy died in November 2024 from a brain injury after fall,
The pair starred together in several acting roles as a powerhouse couple, including the 1984 drama big in brazil at the Old Vic Theatre, London, and several BBC Radio 4 plays.
In her longest sitcom role, Scales played widow Sarah France, the heroine of the ITV drama after henryWhich aired between 1988 and 1992. The series saw forty-year-old Sarah torn between her manipulative mother and teenage daughter, both of whom were demanding her attention.
Other notable TV roles include the long-running documentary series horizon As Florence Hastings, lady-in-waiting to Queen Victoria in a satirical sketch show On the margin and 1972 Country matters, which was set shortly after World War I and starred Ian McKellen.
Scales made a voice cameo in his most recent QueenA stage theatrical adaptation of The Letters of Queen Victoria, ending its run in London in 2024. She provided the voice of Queen Victoria.
Scales played this character more than 400 times. An Evening with Queen VictoriaA play written for him by Katharina Hendre in 1979.
She played Queen Victoria on several other occasions, including in the BBC drama-documentary Victoria: an intimate historyWhich aired in 2003.
Between 2014 and 2021, Scales and her husband appeared in the travel documentary series great canal toursIn which he traveled on small boats around the UK’s canal network. In the final series of the programme, West said that Scales’ condition had worsened, and that she was also losing her hearing.
Scales was diagnosed with vascular dementia in 2013, a common type of dementia caused by decreased blood flow to the brain. The actor’s late husband West wrote about her condition in his 2023 memoir, Pru and me, In which information was given about their 60 year old love story, the memory of Scales and his taking a step back from acting.
He has two sons and a stepdaughter, seven grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.