English actor, comedian, screenwriter, producer, and presenter John Cleese paid tribute to British actress Prunella Scales, who died “peacefully at her home” in London on October 27, 2025, BBC reported. The Scales passing was confirmed by her sons, Samuel and Joseph, via PA News Agency.Prunella Scales appeared as Sybil Fawlty on the BBC sitcom Fawlty Towers opposite John Cleese's character, Basil Fawlty. The show was co-created by Cleese and his now-ex-wife, Connie Booth.According to Hello! Magazine, Cleese earlier revealed that his divorce from Booth was due to his perfectionism.Now, in the wake of his co-star Prunella Scales' demise, Cleese remembered her as “ a really wonderful comic actress.” The press statement, according to the BBC, read:"How very sad. Pru was a really wonderful comic actress. I've recently been watching a number of clips of Fawlty Towers whilst researching a book. Scene after scene, she was absolutely perfect. She was a very sweet lady who spent a lot of her life apologising. I used to tease her about it. I was very, very fond of her."Connie Booth also appeared in the series, which ran between 1975 and 1979 for two seasons. She played the role of waitress, housekeeper, and struggling actress, Polly Sherman.Exploring the relationship between John Cleese and Connie BoothAccording to Hello! Magazine, John Cleese, 86, met Connie Booth, 84, in the USA in the mid-1960s. They walked down the aisle in 1968. The couple’s only child, Cynthia Cleese, was born in 1971. They divorced in 1978.They co-wrote and co-starred in Fawlty Towers. However, before the release of the second and final season, they were already divorced, but continued to remain close friends, co-parents, and professional collaborators.Speaking about their split, John Cleese once said in an interview:"I had a perfectionist streak, and I got terribly wound up over things. Writing Fawlty Towers meant going over everything again and again until we got it right. That attitude contributed to our break-up."Connie Booth also mentioned in a separate interview:"I used to watch a lot of comedy until I got divorced. Then I went off it."She also admitted that writing Fawlty Towers helped her and John Cleese to relieve a lot of their “frustrations with each other” through the characters, as co-writing acted as a form of “therapy.”Their daughter, Cynthia Cleese, later acted in a few sitcoms, including A Fish Called Wanda and Fierce Creatures, alongside her father. Cynthia was married to filmmaker and producer Ed Solomon between 1995 and 2011, and they shared two children.John Cleese married three more times after his divorce from Connie Booth. His second wife was the late American model and actress Barbara Trentham. The couple were together from 1981 to 1990 and shared a daughter, Camilla Cleese, born in 1984. Camilla is now an actress, too.John Cleese tied the knot with American psychotherapist, author, and radio/ talk show host Alyce Eichelberger in 1992. Their marriage lasted for 16 years before they got divorced in 2008. They did not share any children. In 2012, the Monty Python co-founder married his fourth and current wife, Jennifer Wade. She is an English jewelry designer and former model.Meanwhile, Connie Booth found love again in American theater critic, biographer, and writer John Lahr, and the duo has been married since 2000. Before that, they dated for 15 years. He previously worked as a staff writer and senior drama critic for The New Yorker. As for Booth, she quit acting in 1995 and became a psychotherapist after studying it for five years at the University of London.Earlier this year, Connie spoke to Radio Times on the 50th anniversary of Fawlty Towers and credited her ex-husband for the dialogue writing.“In the year and a half it took to write Fawlty Towers, John and I never imagined the impact the show would have. On its 50th anniversary, I’d like to take the opportunity to get something straight: John wrote the dialogue. Before that dialogue was written, he and I developed the plots,” she shared.Prunella Scales and Timothy West at LAMDA Royal Gala 2017 - Source: GettyConnie Booth added that she would have been “fine” with getting credit for the storyline and giving the writing credit to John. However, John Cleese claimed that it didn’t happen in television comedies and “insisted on co-authorship.”She further stated:“Yielding to John’s generous offer turned out to be a kind of poisoned chalice. For half a century, I’ve been receiving praise for lines that John wrote. When people quote back words from the script, instead of flattered, I felt counterfeit. I’ve had to say, ‘No, John wrote that.’ Because I’m American, this disclosure about the pitch-perfect dialogue may be self-evident.”Connie Booth concluded by saying that on the show’s 50th anniversary, she wants everyone to celebrate their work but also the “truth.”Prunella Scales’ official cause of death remains undisclosed. However, she had been living with vascular dementia since her 2013 diagnosis. Her husband and actor Timothy West passed away in November 2024, aged 90. They are survived by their two sons, Samuel and Joseph, and several grandchildren and great-grandchildren.