Editing Count von Count

{{short description|Character on Sesame Street}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=December 2018}}
{{multiple issues|
 {{more citations needed|article|date=February 2011}}
 {{tone|date=January 2021}}
 {{cleanup rewrite|date=January 2021}}
}}
{{Infobox character
| name = Count von Count
| series = [[Sesame Street]]
| image = Count von Count kneeling.png
| image_size = 225px
| caption =
| first = Gordon and Susan meet Sam the Robot (November 13, 1972)
| creator = [[Norman Stiles]]
| lbl1 = Performed by
| data1 = {{Plainlist|
*[[Jerry Nelson]] (1972–2012)
*[[Matt Vogel (puppeteer)|Matt Vogel]] (2013–present)
}}
| alias = The Count
| species = Muppet Vampire
| gender = Male
| nationality = [[Romanians|Romanian]]
}}
'''Count von Count''' (known simply as '''the Count''') is a [[List of Sesame Street Muppets|Muppet]] character on the [[PBS]]/[[HBO]] [[children's television series|children's television show]] ''[[Sesame Street]].'' He is meant to parody [[Bela Lugosi]]'s vampiric character, [[Count Dracula]]. His first appearance on the show was in the 4th season premiere in 1972, where he counts blocks in a sketch with [[Bert and Ernie]].

==Description and personality==
{{more citations needed section|date=March 2020}}
The Count's main role is to teach [[counting]] skills to children.<ref>Coffey, Jerry (October 6, 1972). "[https://www.newspapers.com/image/632901431/ New Faces Coming to 'Sesame Street']". ''Fort Worth Star-Telegram''. p. 6-B.</ref> His catchphrase is, "Greetings! I am The Count. They call me the Count because I love to count{{nbs}}... things".{{Notetag|During the first several years of The Count's incarnation in the 1970s, it was "Greetings! I am The Count. Do you know why they call me the Count? Because I love to count!"}} The Count loves counting so much that he will often [[arithmomania|count anything and everything]] regardless of size or amount, to the point of annoying other characters. The Count can occasionally lose his temper if interrupted while counting, or feel sad when there is nothing around for him to count. Apart from these, he is typically portrayed as friendly and cheerful. Once he reaches the total number of items he is counting, [[thunderstorm]]s roll (even indoors or on sunny days) while he laughs his iconic "Ah-Ah-Ah!" staccato laugh.

The Count lives in an old [[cobweb]]-infested [[castle]] which he shares with many bats, a wolf named Yuba, and a cat named Fatatita. As a running gag, his castle has a squeaky door, which visitors always point out, only for the Count to instantly change the subject to his counting addiction. The Count drives a special car, the Countmobile, which is designed to look like a bat (cf. [[Batmobile]]).

The Count has been shown with a number of girlfriends, who tend to be vampire Countesses. These include Countess von Backwards (debuted in ''Sesame Street''{{'s}} 28th season), who counts backwards, her total is indicated by a wolf howl; Countess Dahling von Dahling (debuted in the 12th season); and one simply called "the Countess" (first appearing in season 8). The von Count family includes an unnamed brother and mother as well as an Uncle Uno and grandparents. When the grandmother counts, it rains, and when the grandfather counts, it snows. 

The Count has a personal cloud hovering over him, which is the source of his thunder and lightning. Some residents of Sesame Street have been disturbed by it in a few episodes. For example, in episode 0974, he was counting at midnight, disturbing others, and as his punishment, the Amazing Mumford used magic to detach his cloud, therefore taking his thunder and lightning away until he understood. This episode was inspired by the 1978 ''Sesame Street'' bedtime storybook titled "Who Stole the Count's Thunder?".

According to BBC News, during an interview with the ''[[More or Less (radio programme)|More or Less]]'' team's Tim Harford, the Count said his favorite number is 34,969. The Count was quoted as saying, "It's a square-root thing.": 34,969 is a [[square number|perfect square]], being 187<sup>2</sup>.<ref name="BBC America">{{cite news|title=Why was 34,969 Count von Count's magic number?|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19409960|access-date=August 31, 2012|publisher=BBC America|date=August 30, 2012}}</ref>

The Count's signature song is "The Song of the Count". The song was written by Jeff Moss as a traditional Hungarian [[Csárdás]].

==Character history==
The Count debuted on ''Sesame Street'' in Episode 0406, the premiere of Season 4 (1972–73). He was conceived by [[Norman Stiles]],<ref>"[https://www.newspapers.com/image/521436704/ WMC to conferr 300 degrees on Saturday]". ''The Evening Sun'' (Westminster, Maryland). May 23, 1985. p. 59.</ref> who wrote the first script. In the Count's very first scene, [[Ernie (Sesame Street)|Ernie]] told [[Bert (Sesame Street)|Bert]] to watch his [[pyramid]] of blocks and make sure nothing happened to it while he got his camera to take a picture of the pyramid. The Count then walked by, counted the blocks, and in the process, took Ernie's pyramid apart before Bert could stop him. He then counted the blocks again, moving them back into place. Bert yelled at the Count for moving Ernie's blocks, so the Count counted the blocks again, taking the pyramid apart.<ref>Luparello, Ben (October 29, 1972). "[https://www.newspapers.com/image/465791163/ Few New Sights on Sesame Street]". ''New York Daily News''. p. 20.</ref> The Count was performed by [[Jerry Nelson]], who brought the character to life. He is made out of the Large Lavender Live Hand Anything Muppet pattern.

Before a counting session, he originally greeted the viewers (and the characters) by saying, "Greetings. I am the Count. They call me the Count because I LOVE to count{{nbs}}... things." Nelson voiced the Count until his death on August 23, 2012. At that time, [[Matt Vogel (puppeteer)|Matt Vogel]] had taken over performing the puppetry of the Count. Upon Nelson's death, Vogel started performing both the Count's voice and puppetry. His first performance of the Count was in a YouTube video called "Counting the Yous in YouTube", a song about the celebration of ''Sesame Street''{{'s}} [[YouTube]] channel reaching 1&nbsp;billion views.

Despite the fact that the Count is now friendly and non-threatening, in his earliest appearances from 1972 to 1975, he showed a much more villainous nature. To begin a counting session, the Count would enter the scene holding his [[cape]] over his face in an exaggerated Lugosi-style pose before reciting his greeting, and he was often accompanied by creepy organ music. He would not even let anything interrupt him while counting, and to prevent this, he shouted "SILENCE!" and used hypnotic powers to temporarily stun people with a wave of his hands (although he sometimes did this without shouting anything, and even did it for no reason, occasionally). He only did this twice. In his first appearance, he hypnotized Bert before counting Ernie's pyramid blocks, while on season 5, during a skit with Grover, the waiter, he hypnotized Grover to serve him more hot dogs to count instead of eating, leaving Grover breathless.<ref>''[[Sesame Street]]'' Episode 0406</ref> And after counting, he would [[maniacal laughter|laugh maniacally]], "MWAH HA HA HA HA HAAAA!!!", while thunder and lightning flashed in moody colors, and then he would exit the scene, once again, holding his cape over his face. This aspect of the Count's personality, however, was abruptly ended in 1975 out of concern that it might frighten younger viewers, and this practice was changed, as he became friendlier, did not have hypnotic powers, did not enter or exit the scene holding his cape over his face, and interacted more pleasantly with the characters (both live actors and Muppets).{{Citation needed|date=July 2016}} Also, the creepy organ music was removed, the lightning flashes were changed from moodily colored to normally colored, and his laugh was changed from a maniacal laugh to a more throaty, triumphant Lugosi-style laugh, "Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah!"

[[Belvedere Castle]], in New York's [[Central Park]], was used for exterior [[establishing shot]]s of the Count's castle on the show.

The Count made an appearance in the film ''[[The Muppets Take Manhattan]]'' at [[Kermit the Frog]] and [[Miss Piggy]]'s wedding, then in the ''Sesame Street'' movies ''[[Follow That Bird]]'' (1985) as a supporting character and ''[[The Adventures of Elmo in Grouchland]]'' (1999) as a minor character. The Count appeared onscreen during the closing credits of ''Follow That Bird,'' where he proceeded to read and count the credits. He also said, "Hi, Mom." when a credit appears for [[Joan Ganz Cooney]], creator of ''Sesame Street''.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089994/trivia |title=Follow That Bird (1985) - Trivia |publisher=IMDb}}</ref>

In Season 33, the Count was given a daily segment on ''Sesame Street'', simply called ''[[List of Sesame Street recurring segments#Number of the Day|The Number of the Day]]''.

The Count was originally portrayed by [[Jerry Nelson]]. However, Nelson's health began to deteriorate in 2004, so he retired from performing all his characters except for the Count and his other ''Sesame Street'' characters. Due to his increasingly failing health, Nelson could no longer puppeteer the character of the Count, so he handed over puppeteering duties to [[Matt Vogel (puppeteer)|Matt Vogel]], though Nelson still continued to voice the Count. After Nelson's death in 2012, Vogel took over voicing and puppeteering the Count full time the following year.

==In other languages==
* In the [[Dutch language|Dutch]] version of the series, ''[[Sesamstraat]]'', the Count's name is Graaf Tel (literally, "[[Count]] (nobleman) [[Counting|Count]] (the process of counting)").
* In the Finnish dub of the series, ''Seesamtie'', his name is Kreivi Kamreeri ("Count Chamberlain")
* In the French series ''[[1, Rue Sésame]]'', his name is Comte von Compte.
* In the German series ''[[Sesamstraße]]'', his name is Graf Zahl (literally, "[[Count]] Number").
* In the [[Hebrew language|Hebrew]] series ''[[Rechov Sumsum]]'', his name is 'מר סופר', phonetically pronounced 'Mar Sofer', which literally means "Mr. Counter".
* In the Mexican series ''[[Plaza Sésamo]]'', his name is Conde Contar (literally, "Count of Counting").
* In the [[Polish language|Polish]] series ''[[Ulica Sezamkowa]]'', his name is Liczyhrabia (literally, "Countcount").
* In the Portuguese series ''[[Rua Sésamo]]'', his name is Conde de Contar (translated as "Count of Counting").
* In the Russian series ''[[Ulitsa Sezam]]'', his name is Graf Znak (Граф Знак) (translated as "symbol" or "sign" as the mathematical categories).
* In the Spanish series, ''[[Barrio Sésamo]]'', his name is Conde Draco.
* In the [[Turkish language|Turkish]] series ''[[Susam Sokağı]]'', his name is Sayıların Kontu (literally, "the Count of Numbers")
* In the [[Arabic]] series ''[[Iftah Ya Simsim]]'', his name is Addad (literally, "Number").

==Appearances outside ''Sesame Street''==
* The Count was interviewed in character on the [[BBC Radio 4]] economics programme ''[[More or Less (radio programme)|More or Less]]'' on December 11, 2009, where he mentioned his favorite number, 34,969.
* He appeared on the [[Halloween]] edition of ''[[SportsCenter]]'' to count down the top ten trick plays of the [[2010 NCAA Division I FBS football season|2010 college football season]].
* He was a guest on ''[[Countdown with Keith Olbermann]]'' for the first-anniversary episode.
* In the [[Mormon Tabernacle Choir]] 2014 [[PBS]] Christmas Concert ''[[Keep Christmas with You]]'', [[Mormon Tabernacle organist|Tabernacle organist]] [[Richard Elliott (organist)|Richard Elliott]] along with the Count, performed "[[The Twelve Days of Christmas (song)|The Twelve Days of Christmas]]" on the 7,667-pipe [[Conference center organ]].
* He was a guest on ''[[Late Night with Seth Meyers]]'' on March 27, 2015, to help out in the feature "This Week in Numbers".
* He was interviewed in character by ''[[Wired (magazine)|Wired]]'' in a video released on February 22, 2017. In the interview, he cannot decide on a single favorite number, and says he will be 6,523,728 years old "next October."<ref>Archived at [https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211211/fc2yFoq09ug Ghostarchive]{{cbignore}} and the [https://web.archive.org/web/20170223012204/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fc2yFoq09ug&gl=US&hl=en Wayback Machine]{{cbignore}}: {{Citation|title=The Cast of 'Sesame Street' Answer the Web's Most Searched Questions|magazine=Wired|date=February 22, 2017|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fc2yFoq09ug|access-date=1 March 2017|via=YouTube}}{{cbignore}}</ref>
* He has an ongoing role in supporting the [[United States Census]] in public service announcements.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Sesame Street wants to get young children counted in the census|website=[[PBS]] |date=2020-03-09 |url=https://www.pbs.org/newshour/arts/sesame-street-wants-to-get-young-children-counted-in-the-census}}</ref>

==In popular culture==
The [[St. Paul Saints]], an [[Independent league baseball|independent]] [[minor league baseball|minor-league]] [[baseball]] team in [[Saint Paul, Minnesota|St. Paul, Minnesota]], known for unique and sometimes over-the-top promotions, announced that it would give away 2,500 bobblehead dolls dressed as the Count at its May 23, 2009 game. However, instead of the Count's regular head, this doll's head featured [[Al Franken]] on one side and [[Norm Coleman]] on the other, and was called "Count von Re-Count"—referring to the extraordinarily prolonged [[election recount|recount]] and legal battle surrounding the [[United States Senate election in Minnesota, 2008|2008 U.S. Senate election]] between the two men. The team made further jabs at the election during the game.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.espn.com/espn/news/story?id=4201396 |title=Saints' gimmick jabs at Senate race |agency=Associated Press |publisher=ESPN |date=May 23, 2009 |access-date=23 May 2009}}</ref>

Australian [[rugby league]] football international [[Anthony Minichiello]] has been nicknamed "the Count" due to his striking resemblance to the character.<ref>[http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/entertainment/sydney-confidential/gallery-e6frex89-1225795738450?page=29 Movie star Muppets] at dailytelegraph.com.au</ref>

During the [[2020 United States presidential election]], which required a ballot-counting period of four days before [[Joe Biden]] was declared the winner, the Count was featured in many internet memes and social media posts, such as playful wishes that he could be called in to assist the tabulation and the insistence that President [[Donald Trump]]'s demand to "Stop the Count" was hopeless against the ''Sesame Street'' character.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Lin |first1=Connie |title=Meme makers enlist Sesame Street's Count von Count in the fight to tally every vote |url=https://www.fastcompany.com/90572571/meme-makers-enlist-sesame-streets-count-von-count-in-the-fight-to-tally-every-vote |access-date=7 November 2020 |agency=F@stcompany |date=7 November 2020}}</ref>

==See also==
*[[Arithmomania#In folklore|Arithmomania]] and [[Vampire#Folk beliefs|Vampire]] for other vampires with a compulsion to count

==Notes==
{{Notefoot}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

{{Sesame Street Characters}}
{{Dracula}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Count Von Count}}
[[Category:Fictional counts and countesses]]
[[Category:Fictional vampires]]
[[Category:Sesame Street Muppet characters]]
[[Category:Television characters introduced in 1972]]
[[Category:Transylvania in fiction]]
[[Category:Fictional American people]]
[[Category:Fictional Romanian people]]
[[Category:Vampires in television]]
[[Category:Fictional immigrants to the United States]]
[[Category:American gothic fiction]]
[[Category:Cultural depictions of Bela Lugosi]]
[[Category:Male characters in television]]
[[Category:Alternative versions of Dracula]]