The Return of the Classic Films Obituary Thread

[CBHagman]

73. Stage, screen, and television actor Prunella Scales, 93

Last edited Wed Oct 29, 2025, 07:47 PM - Edit history (2)

Prunella Scales' decades-long career involved roles in everything from Britcoms to feature films with some of cinema's most acclaimed creative teams.

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2025/oct/28/fawlty-towers-actor-prunella-scales-dies-at-the-age-of-93

Prunella Scales, the actor best known for playing Sybil Fawlty in the classic comedy series Fawlty Towers, has died aged 93.

Scales, who was married to fellow actor Timothy West , was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 2013.

The actor died peacefully at home in London on Monday, her sons, Samuel and Joseph, said.

On edit: Here's a gift link to The Washington Post obituary, which includes photos and video:

https://wapo.st/49qRTXv

Prunella Scales, comically imperious wife on ‘Fawlty Towers,’ dies at 93

Her greatest theatrical triumph was in “A Question of Attribution,” part of Alan Bennett’s 1988 twin bill “Single Spies.” She portrayed Queen Elizabeth II opposite Bennett as Sir Anthony Blunt, the art historian and Soviet spy. The show was the hit of London that year, and it traveled to Washington and other cities. The two parts were commissioned by the BBC as separate television plays.

“It was extraordinarily enjoyable, from my point of view, because of the blasphemy factor,” she told Britain’s Independent newspaper. “You come on, looking as nearly as possible like the Queen; the attention was wonderful. I suddenly realized how terribly famous people must feel.”

Ms. Scales worked occasionally in films, with small roles in dramas such as “Room at the Top” (1959), “The Boys From Brazil” (1978) and “Howards End” (1992). She had a more robust supporting part in “A Chorus of Disapproval” (1989), based on Alan Ayckbourn’s hit stage comedy, playing Anthony Hopkins’s wife and Jeremy Irons’s lover.