Prunella Scales
Acting
Biography
Prunella Margaret Rumney West Scales CBE (née Illingworth; 22 June 1932) was an English former actor, best known for playing Sybil Fawlty, wife of Basil Fawlty (John Cleese), in the BBC comedy Fawlty Towers; for her portrayal of Queen Elizabeth II in A Question of Attribution (Screen One, BBC 1991) by Alan Bennett (for which she was nominated for a BAFTA award); and for the documentary series Great Canal Journeys (2014–2021), in which she travels on canal barges and narrowboats with her husband, fellow actor Timothy West.
As actor 104
Midsomer Murders
1997
Casualty
1986
Silent Witness
1996
Loose Women
1999
Agatha Christie's Marple
2004
BBC Play of the Month
1965
Playhouse
1974
Bergerac
1981
Film '72
1971
Thirty-Minute Theatre
1965
Dalziel and Pascoe
1996
An Audience with...
1978
ScreenPlay
1986
Fawlty Towers
1975
Screen One
1989
The BBC Television Shakespeare
1978
Never the Twain
1981
Target
1977
Howards End
1992
After Henry
1988
Theatre Night
1985
Country Matters
1972
Mapp & Lucia
1985
Dennis the Menace and Gnasher
1996
Great Canal Journeys
2014
The Boys from Brazil
1978
Wolf
1994
Faces of Jim
1961
Emma
1996
Marriage Lines
1961
Unnatural Causes
1986
Seven of One
1973
Look at the State We're In!
1995
Horrid Henry: The Movie
2011
Weekend Playhouse
1984
Sub Rosa
2014
Thompson
1988
Signs and Wonders
1995
Dickens
2002
Pride and Prejudice
1952
Hobson's Choice
1954
An Awfully Big Adventure
1995
The Wicked Lady
1983
The Hound of the Baskervilles
1978
Room at the Top
1958
Keeping Mum
1997
Fair Game
1994
Looking for Victoria
2003
The World of Lee Evans
1995
The Funny Blokes of British Comedy
2005
The Rector's Wife
1994
The Merry Wives of Windsor
1982
Second Best
1994
Home Cooking
1986
Consuming Passions
1988
S.W.A.L.K.
1982
The Royal
2003
Freddie As F.R.O.7.
1992
50 Years of BBC Two Comedy
2014
The World of Peter Rabbit and Friends: The Tale of Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle and Mr. Jeremy Fisher
1994
A Chorus of Disapproval
1989
The Cancellation Of Fawlty Towers
2025
An Ideal Husband
1999
Dirty Beasts
1990
The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne
1987
A Question of Attribution
1991
What the Pythons Did Next...
2007
When We Are Married
1987
Fawlty Towers Revisited
2005
Communicators From Hell
1989
Station Jim
2001
Natural Causes
1988
The Crowded Day
1954
Run For Your Wife
2012
The Tale of Little Pig Robinson
1990
Fawlty Towers: Re-Opened
2009
Bosses From Hell
1989
Mad Cows
1999
Revolting Rhymes
1990
The Phone Call
2013
The Achurch Letters
1977
The Littlest Horse Thieves
1976
Waltz of the Toreadors
1962
Breaking the Code
1996
Think
2007
The Shell Seekers
2007
A Day In The Death Of Joe Egg
2002
The Ghost of Greville Lodge
2000
Doris and Doreen
1978
Stiff Upper Lips
1998
Absurd Person Singular
1985
Mr. Loveday's Little Outing
2006
The Ring of Truth
1973
The Apple Cart
1975
What Every Woman Wants
1954
My Friend Walter
1992
What the Butler Saw
1987
Lord of Misrule
1996
Outside Edge
1982
Slimming Down
1984
Laxdale Hall
1953
An Audience with Alf Garnett
1997
Singles
1983
Beyond The Pale
1989