I Can Count to 10 and Back Again Sesame Street

May 10, 2022 Post a Comment

Character on Sesame Street

The Count
Sesame Street character

Commencement appearance	Episode 0406 (Nov thirteen, 1972)
Created by	Norman Stiles
Voiced past	Jerry Nelson (1972–2012) Matt Vogel (2013–present)
Performed by	Jerry Nelson (1972–2004) Matt Vogel (2004–nowadays)
In-universe information
Alias	The Count
Species	Muppet Vampire
Gender	Male
Nationality	Romanaian

Count von Count (known simply every bit the Count) is a mysterious merely friendly vampire Muppet on the long-running PBS/HBO children'due south television show Sesame Street who is meant to parody Bela Lugosi'south portrayal of Count Dracula. He get-go appeared on the show in the Season 4 premiere in 1972, counting blocks in a sketch with Bert and Ernie.

Clarification and personality [edit]

The Count's main role is to teach counting skills to children. The Count loves counting so much (every bit said in his signature greeting, "They call me the Count because I love to count things.") that he ofttimes will count anything and everything regardless of size or amount, to the point of abrasive other characters. In Episode 0539 (Season v, 1973), for case, he hired Ernie to answer his phone so that he would not be bothered while looking for things to count. He then impulsively forbade him from answering the beginning call that came through until it was way too late because he wanted to count all 5 times the telephone rang, and a mêlée resulted when the caller re-tried, resulting in an argument with Ernie. In Episode 1970 (Season 16, 1984), on his first mean solar day of serving as an elevator operator, he foolishly neglected to let Kermit the Frog out at his selected flooring, because he wanted to count all 10 floors in the building, and was unable to stop until he finished, leaving Kermit very angry. In Episode 3489 (Season 27, 1996), he tricked Oscar the Grouch into saying the word "no" 17 times, past continuously knocking on his trash can and prodding him to help the Count find something to count 17 of. The Count can occasionally lose his temper if interrupted while counting, or experience lamentable when there is zilch around for him to count. But autonomously from these, he is typically portrayed as friendly and cheerful. Once he reaches the total number of his targeted item to count, thunderstorms roll (fifty-fifty indoors) 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. He spent his childhood in the Carpathian Mountains, which makes information technology clear he is Romanian, as explained in his most famous vocal, "The Batty Bat". His pet bats tend to have Slavic names, such as Grisha, Misha, Sasha, and Tatiana. He views the bats as his "children" and sometimes counts them. Equally a running gag, his castle has a squeaky door, which visitors always point out, but for the Count to instantly change the subject field to his counting addiction. The Count drives a special car, the Countmobile, designed to look similar 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 (debuting in Sesame Street's 28th flavour), who counts backward, her full is indicated past a wolf howl; Countess Dahling von Dahling (debuted in the 12th season); and one just called "The Countess" (first appearing in flavour viii). The von Count family unit includes an unnamed brother and female parent as well every bit an Uncle Uno and grandparents. His grandparents are unnamed, just they too love to count and have a similar laugh (ah ah ah!), but instead of thunder and lightning, Grandma Count's counting makes it rain, and Grandpa Count'southward counting makes it snow.

The Count has a personal cloud hovering over him, which is the possibility of the source of his thunder and lightning. Some residents have been disturbed past it in a few episodes. For example, it interrupted Kermit'southward broadcast at the Three Little Pigs' house, and the pigs were frightened by it, thinking rain would follow, and in episode 0974, he was counting at midnight, and as his punishment, the Amazing Mumford used magic to detach his deject, therefore taking his thunder and lightning away until he understood. This episode was featured in a 1978 Sesame Street bedtime storybook titled "Who Stole the Count's Thunder?"

Co-ordinate to BBC News, during an interview with the More or Less team's Tim Harford, the Count said his favorite number is 34,969. The Count was quoted equally maxim, "It's a foursquare-root thing.": 34,969 is a perfect square, being 187ⁱⁱ.^[1]

The Count's signature song is "The Vocal of the Count". The song was written by Jeff Moss equally a traditional Hungarian Csárdás. He might not be a vampire in the classic sense, given that he has been seen with a reflection in a mirror, and he has no problem with beingness out in the daylight.

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 declining wellness, Nelson could no longer puppeteer the character of the Count, so he handed over puppeteering duties to Matt Vogel, though Nelson still continued to voice the Count. After Nelson'due south death in 2012, Vogel took over voicing and puppeteering the Count full fourth dimension the following yr.

Graphic symbol history [edit]

The Count debuted on Sesame Street in Episode 0406, the premiere of Season 4 (1972–73), and he was conceived past Norman Stiles, who wrote the starting time script. In the Count's very first scene, Ernie told Bert to scout his pyramid of blocks and brand sure nothing happened to it while he got his camera to take a picture of the pyramid. The Count and so walked by, counted the blocks, and in the process, took Ernie'south pyramid apart before Bert could stop him. He then counted the blocks again, moving them back into identify. Bert yelled at the Count for moving Ernie's blocks, so the Count counted the blocks again, taking the pyramid autonomously. The Count was performed by Jerry Nelson, who brought the character to life. He is made out of the Large Lavander Live Mitt Annihilation Muppet design. 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... things." Nelson voiced the Count until his death on August 23, 2012. At that time, Matt Vogel had taken over performing the puppetry of the Count. Upon Nelson'south death, Vogel started performing both the Count's voice and puppetry. His showtime functioning of the Count was in a YouTube video chosen "Counting the Yous in YouTube", a vocal virtually the commemoration of Sesame Street's YouTube channel reaching ane billion views.

Despite the fact that the Count is now friendly and non-threatening, in his primeval 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 allow 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 but did this twice. In his first appearance, he hypnotized Bert earlier counting Ernie's pyramid blocks, while on flavor 5, during a skit with Grover, the waiter, he hypnotized Grover to serve him more hot dogs to count instead of eating, leaving Grover incoherent.^[2] And afterward counting, he would express mirth maniacally, "MWAH HA HA HA HA HAAAA!!!", while thunder and lightning flashed in moody colors, and so he would exit the scene, once once again, holding his cape over his face. This attribute of the Count'due south personality, however, was abruptly ended in 1975 out of business concern that it might frighten younger viewers, and this practice was changed, as he became friendlier, did non 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 ]} Also, the creepy organ music was removed, the lightning flashes were changed from moodily colored to normally colored, and his express mirth was changed from a maniacal laugh to a more throaty, triumphant Lugosi-style express joy, "Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah!"

Dais Castle, in New York'southward Primal Park, was used for exterior establishing shots of the Count's castle on the testify.

The Count made an advent in the picture show The Muppets Accept Manhattan at Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy'south wedding, then in the Sesame Street movies Follow That Bird (1985) as a supporting character and The Adventures of Elmo in Grouchland (1999) equally a minor character. Notably, the Count appeared on-screen during the closing credits of Follow That Bird, where he proceeded to read and count the credits. He also said, "Hello, Mom." when a credit appears for Joan Ganz Cooney, creator of Sesame Street.^[three]

In Flavor 33, the Count got a daily segment on Sesame Street, simply called The Number of the Day.

Internationally [edit]

In the Dutch version of the series, Sesamstraat, the Count'south name is Graaf Tel (literally, "Count (nobleman) Count (the process of counting)").
In the French serial one, Rue Sésame, his name is Comte von Compte.
In the High german series Sesamstraße, his name is Graf Zahl (literally, "Count Number").
In the Hebrew series Rechov Sumsum, his proper noun 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 Smooth series Ulica Sezamkowa, his proper 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 Улица Сезам, his name is Graf Znak (Граф Знак) (translated as "symbol" or "sign" as the mathematical categories).
In the Castilian series, Barrio Sésamo, his name is Conde Draco.
In the Turkish series Susam Sokağı, his name is Sayıların Kontu (literally, "The Count of Numbers")

Appearances outside Sesame Street [edit]

The Count appeared on a video parcel aired on the first episode of the Belatedly Show with David Letterman that was shown afterwards Letterman's emergency quintuple bypass operation. He appeared as a surgeon in an operating theater, counting "One bypass... AH AH AH! Two featherbed..."^{[ citation needed ]}
The Count was interviewed in character on the BBC Radio four economics plan More than or Less on Dec eleven, 2009, where he mentioned his favorite number, 34969.
He appeared on the Halloween edition of SportsCenter to count down the meridian ten play a trick on plays of the 2010 higher football season.
He was a guest on Countdown with Keith Olbermann for the commencement-anniversary episode.
He was animated in Family Guy counting bats, and and then Peter Griffin asked if the Count had ever "done someone in." In a after episode, when he is dating One thousand thousand Griffin, he counts three nipples then leaves immediately in disgust.
He was as well animated in The Simpsons, this time counting coconuts. Marge Simpson admits her dislike towards the Count. She gets upset and yells, "Go back to your own country!". In another episode, Homer Simpson and Count Dracula asked him where they could find Lisa Simpson and Edmund, who had run abroad together. The Count is as well seen sucking Big Bird'due south blood. The Count likewise appears along with Elmo and Big Bird at the Springfield water ice show.
In the Mormon Tabernacle Choir 2022 PBS Christmas Concert Keep Christmas with Y'all, Tabernacle organist Richard Elliott along with the Count, performed "The Twelve Days of Christmas" on the 7,667-pipe Briefing centre organ.
He was a guest on Late Night with Seth Meyers on March 27, 2015, to help out in the feature "This Calendar week in Numbers".
In the video game Plague Inc., an achievement references The Count, which is triggered when the player's vampire makes 123 victims in the USA.
He was interviewed in character by Wired in a video released on February 22, 2017. In the interview, he cannot decide on a unmarried favorite number, and says he will exist 6,523,728 years quondam "side by side October."^[four]
He has an on-going role in supporting the United States Demography in public service announcements.^[5]

In popular culture [edit]

The St. Paul Saints, an independent minor-league baseball team in 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. Nonetheless, instead of the Count's regular head, this doll's head featured Al Franken on ane side and Norm Coleman on the other, and was called "Count von Re-Count"—referring to the extraordinarily prolonged recount and legal boxing surrounding the 2008 U.S. Senate election between the two men. The squad made farther jabs at the election during the game.^[6]

Australian rugby league football game international Anthony Minichiello has been nicknamed 'The Count' due to his striking resemblance to the character.^[seven]

During the 2022 United States presidential ballot, which required a ballot-counting catamenia of four days before Joe Biden was declared the winner (a outcome of record-setting utilize of post-in voting and early voting), the Count was featured in many internet memes and social media posts, such as playful wishes that he could be called in to assistance the tabulation and the insistence that President Donald Trump's need to "Stop the Count" was hopeless against the Sesame Street character.^[8]

Notes and references [edit]

^ "Why was 34,969 Count von Count's magic number?". BBC America. August 30, 2012. Retrieved Baronial 31, 2012.
^ Sesame Street Episode 0406
^ "Follow That Bird (1985) - Trivia". IMDb.
^ Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine: "The Cast of 'Sesame Street' Reply the Web's Most Searched Questions", Wired, Feb 22, 2017, retrieved March 1, 2017 – via YouTube
^ "Sesame Street wants to get young children counted in the demography". PBS. March nine, 2020.
^ "Saints' gimmick jabs at Senate race". ESPN. Associated Press. May 23, 2009. Retrieved May 23, 2009.
^ Moving-picture show star Muppets at dailytelegraph.com.au
^ Lin, Connie (November 7, 2020). "Meme makers enlist Sesame Street's Count von Count in the fight to tally every vote". F@stcompany. Retrieved November 7, 2020.