Robert Townsend (b. 1957) is an actor who starred in the TV series The Parent 'Hood as well as the films The Meteor Man (with Bill Cosby) and A Soldier's Story (with Denzel Washington and David Alan Grier).
In a 1992 episode of Sesame Street, Townsend played a character named "Speedy Van Go" who was commissioned to paint the mural on the side of Hooper's Store. Everyone had a different opinion on what it should be about, so he combined everyone's ideas to create the final piece. The fish in the sky was for Wolfgang, and the numbers embedded about the whole mural were for The Count.