Chevalier based his act upon the performances of Alfred Vance, a cockney comedian from the beginnings of the English music hall tradition. Chevalier also drew inspiration from the London characters of Charles Dickens, including Sam Weller, whom Chevalier had played unsuccessfully in a touring show. For the tour, he updated the character by modernising the dialogue and mixing it with the performance style used by mid-century cockney performers, including Vance. The changes resulted in Chevalier inventing a new, sentimental variation of Vance's "criminal coster", which was loosely based on a working-class Londoner.