MISS NICOLA TESSELA
The Character
The character in 'Miss Nicola Tessela' is a secondary school teacher in the position of Head of Year whom was most unlucky and was struck by lightning at some point in her past causing a near instantaneous personality transformation.
She is loosely based on one of my own teachers whom I spent considerable time in the prescence of not being the most model of pupils... By all outward appearances this individual was a perfectionist. From the perspective of a typical pupil most teachers appear as perfectionists and feel the need to inflict this upon the young. Organisation and punctuality were stressed to the extreme with particular emphasis on self-discipline to achieve personal results. Throughout her various lectures the words “appalling” and “appalled” were noticeably overused.
This character is a perfectionist of extremes. Every daily task - no matter how mundane - is to be executed perfectly. Should this not happen then a self-prescribed punishment is issued usually taking the form of electric shocks. Of course, something always goes wrong because nobody is perfect eventually leading to a snowball effect of self-inflicted punishments. Major events of each day are documented in a Daily Report for later review.
She naturally has OCD with extreme cleanliness deriving pleasure and additional income from marking school test papers from all over Europe.
In Reality,
In 1887 Nikola Tesla was born in Croatia in 1856, but he moved to America. He invented a system that transmitted alternating current (AC). It was better then his former boss' (Thomas Edison) direct current system. They would have been awarded a joint Nobel Prize in 1912, but Tesla didn't want anything to do with Edison. Neither of them received a prize as a result. In 1888, Tesla invented the induction motor. He also made the Tesla motor that produces high frequency signals that are used in radios and TVs. Tesla 'died' in 1943.
Episodes
