Count Bobby performer Peter Alexander
Count Bobby (German: Graf Bobby) is a fictional Viennese comic figure, originating as the subject of a traditional joke cycle. Graf Bobby is a refined aristocrat who finds everyday events incomprehensible and speaks in a bland, monotone voice. Many of the jokes about Count Bobby also feature his friend Baron Rudi, who is a little more versed in the ways of the actual world, more energetic and a little brighter, and thus the perfect foil for Bobby. Their stories range from the silly to the downright philosophical.
In the early 1950s these jokes were collected in anthologies, and later he was the main character in a number of films, played by Peter Alexander.
Doctor Hans Asperger compared one of his patients to the character and it is theorized the character is partially based on real life autistic people.Both Count Bobby and Baron Rudi are a little remote from daily life; their education is somewhat problematic; their intellectual abilities are only so-so, but their manners are impeccable. Both have a hard time making ends meet, but are motivated by noblesse oblige. They speak in a slightly bored inflection in a nasal Viennese dialect known as Schönbrunnerdeutsch, or German as spoken at the Habsburg Imperial Court at Schönbrunn.