This caricature is of Juno Salmo, ‘The Golden Mephisto’, when he was performing at the Grand Theatre of Varieties, Hanley. This was either during the week of 2 January 1905 or 16 April 1906. It is one of the many superb caricatures of Edwardian music hall performers that were drawn by the artist George Cooke when he was based at the Grand Theatre. He compiled them in a series of albums.

The contortionist Juno Salmo was known as the homme grenouille or ‘frog-man’ when he performed in Paris with the Nouveau Cirque in a frog costume. He would dislocate his shoulders and hop around the aquatic part of the ring and do acrobatic contortions on a trapeze that appeared to be made of bamboo. He is seen here doing a similar act, but balancing on a pole dressed as a yellow devil. In his inscription on another of Cooke's caricatures of him in this collection, he describes himself as the ‘Mephisto Moderne’. The diabolic theme appears to have been a feature of his unusual act. The reviewer of his performance at Hanley in 1905 commented on the loud applause he received, ‘for his very smart work on a very narrow seat at the top of a tall metal post and on a trapeze’. In 1906 the reviewer noted that he performed ‘some amazing contortions amid remarkable stage effects to sustain the Mephistophelian title to which he assumes’.