The actress died “peacefully at home in London yesterday”, her sons Samuel and Joseph said.
A statement from the heartbroken siblings read: “Our darling mother Prunella Scales died peacefully at home in London yesterday. She was 93.
“Although dementia forced her retirement from a remarkable acting career of nearly 70 years, she continued to live at home.
“She was watching Fawlty Towers the day before she died.
“Pru was married to Timothy West for 61 years. He died in November 2024.
“She is survived by two sons and one stepdaughter, seven grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.
“We would like to thank all those who gave Pru such wonderful care at the end of her life: her last days were comfortable, contented and surrounded by love.”
Before his death in 2024, the late Timothy West spoke of his wife’s diagnosis.
He told how he spent “a lot of time” reassuring Prunella when she was confused.
Timothy said at the time: “I miss Pru’s companionship as my best friend.
“She doesn’t have much awareness of time so when she joins me, her face lights up as if we’ve been apart for days.
“The look on her face makes me realise how much I love her.”
He added: “She seems to manage incredibly well with things, as I try to, but surely she must sometimes wonder whether she is going to be allowed to end her days in this house that has been so dear to us.
“Not recognising me hasn’t been a problem but it will come, I’m sure.”
He revealed he had consulted the couple’s GP about her memory a year before her diagnosis – but had been told not to worry.
Speaking to the BBC soon after the couple’s diamond wedding anniversary in 2023, Timothy said: “Somehow we have coped with it and Pru doesn’t really think about it.”
Timothy also told the Alzheimer’s Society in 2023 that he didn’t know much about the disease before Prunella’s diagnosis.
“I’m unable to have the same in-depth conversation about stage productions with Pru that I used to enjoy. But we continue to do the things we have always done, as it’s important to continue to live,” he explained.
“I appreciate that everyone’s experience of dementia can be different. I’m very sympathetic to anybody who has difficulty, either on their own or having to cope with relatives or friends with dementia.”
Timothy also provided some kind words to other people caring for loved ones with dementia.
“It helps to have people around you who understand. Do what you can and carry on in way that works for you,” he urged.
The actor, who wrote a book about their experience called Pru and Me, said the couple had the “same conversation every day of the week” but “it’s something I never tire of”.
“Repetition doesn’t really exist in Pru’s world and the look on her face when she enters the room and sees me sitting there on the sofa waiting for her makes me realise just how much I love her,” he added.
Prunella herself told The Times in September 2024 her memory was “less good” but added that not being able to work would make her “very depressed”.
She added: “If we’re out of work, we get very depressed. As one gets older, one’s memory and living from minute to minute changes, doesn’t it? You get less efficient.”
The couple’s son Sam revealed in October 2024 Prunella was “fine” and “enjoying a cruise”.
He added: “I’m not sure if she knew where she was but she enjoyed getting there.”
The actress was best known for playing Sybil Fawlty, the stern wife of John Cleese’s Basil Fawlty in classic Seventies sitcom Fawlty Towers.
The show ran for two series of six episodes each in 1975 and 1979 and is considered one of the best British comedy series ever made.
In a touching tribute, John Cleese described his on-screen wife and Fawlty Towers co-star Prunella as “a really wonderful comic actress,” adding: “Scene after scene she was absolutely perfect.”
She appeared in soap Coronation Street between January and February 1961 as bus conductress Eileen Hughes.
And played Queen Victoria more than 400 times in a play written for her by Katrina Hendrey in 1979.
And as recently as August 2024 she reprised the role again aged 92 to provide voice over for the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
The production, Queen, saw Prunella voice an 81-year-old Victoria, reading out her letters.
Julian Machin, a stage manager on the original production, said Prunella’s acting was impressive even despite her dementia.
He told The Telegraph: “Although Prunella has vascular dementia, which greatly affects her in many ways, she absolutely retains longer-term memory of herself and her working experience.”
Prunella sees recording machinery and “just goes into it,” he revealed in another interview with The Guardian, adding: “It just took her back into herself. It was quite astonishing.”
Asked in September 2024 if she liked playing royals, Prunella told The Times: “I don’t. When you say ‘like playing queens’ there aren’t any queens that I want to play.
“But the queens I have played have all been interesting people with interesting jobs and interesting lives.
“And that’s why I like playing them. I don’t like playing queens as such.”
In later life, between 2014 and 2019, Prunella filmed Great Canal Journeys, a Channel 4 series celebrating their love of narrow boating.
Prunella was born in Surrey in 1932, the daughter of actress Catherine (née Scales) and cotton salesman John Richardson Illingworth.
At the start of the Second World War in 1939 the family was evacuated to Devon.
By 1942 Prunella was given a scholarship to Moira House School, which had been evacuated from Eastbourne to a hotel on Lake Windermere in Lancashire.
She started her career as an assistant stage manager at the Bristol Old Vic in 1951, but had “always wanted to be an actor”.
Her break as an actor came in the 1960s when she appeared in sitcom Marriage Lines.
Fawlty Towers came in the 1970s and by the end of the 1980s and 90s she’d performed in 11 films.
In 1993 she voiced Mrs Tiggy-Winkle in The World of Peter Rabbit and Friends.
For 10 years she appeared in an iconic set of Tesco adverts alongside roles as Miss Bates in a TV-movie adaptation of Emma in 1996 and as Minny Stinkler in comedy film Mad Cows in 1997.
She was awarded the Freedom of the City of London in 1999 before being appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1992 Birthday Honours List.
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