Overview
- Sons Samuel and Joseph West announced that their mother died peacefully at home on Monday and had watched Fawlty Towers the day before.
- Scales’ defining role as Sybil Fawlty anchored the BAFTA-winning sitcom, which marked its 50th anniversary this year and remains a touchstone of British comedy.
- The BBC altered its schedule to broadcast the episode The Builders on BBC One and iPlayer as a tribute, with on-demand availability for 30 days.
- John Cleese praised her as “a really wonderful comic actress” whose scenes were “absolutely perfect,” and BBC comedy chief Jon Petrie called her “a national treasure.”
- Diagnosed with vascular dementia in 2013, she stepped back from work but continued to live at home; she is survived by two sons, a stepdaughter, seven grandchildren and four great-grandchildren, and her husband Timothy West died in November 2024.