This is John Liston (1776-1846), one of the leading comic actors of his day, as the busybody Paul Pry. Several different figurines of Liston as Pry were produced, based on contemporary engravings, after his huge success in John Poole's play Paul Pry which opened at London's Haymarket Theatre on 13 September 1825. The play was enormously popular throughout the 19th century; Paul Pry's catch-phrases 'I hope I don't intrude', 'Just dropped in' and 'It's nothing to me' were quoted everywhere, and the name Paul Pry became a well-known term for a busybody. The character regularly carried an umbrella, but this is missing from this figurine although evident in another example of the piece, S.947-1996.

Liston achieved his greatest successes in farce, particularly as Paul Pry, but was well known for several other roles which were also seen in drawings, painting, engravings and figurines. An expert dancer, he became the highest-paid comedian on the stage, earning between sixty and a hundred pounds a week at the Olympic Theatre, a huge salary for his day. He retired in 1837 after a career that spanned over thirty years.