Nokes was, to the last night of his career, famous for his impersonation of the Nurse in two plays; first, in that strange adaptation by Otway of "Romeo and Juliet" to a Roman tragedy, "Caius Marius;" and secondly, in Nevil Payne's fierce, yet not bombastic drama, "Fatal Jealousy." Of the portraits to be found in Cibber's gallery, one of the most perfect, drawn by Colley's hand, is that of James Nokes. Cibber attributes his general excellence to "a plain and palpable simplicity of nature, which was so utterly his own, that he was often as accountably diverting in his common speech as on the stage." His very conversation was an unctuous acting; and, in the truest sense of the word, he was "inimitable." Cibber himself, accomplished mimic as he was, confessedly failed in every attempt to reproduce the voice and manner of James Nokes, who identified himself with every part so easily, as to reap a vast amount of fame at the cost of hardly an hour's study. His range was through the entire realm of broad comedy, and Cibber thus photographs him for the entertainment of posterity.
"He scarce ever made his first entrance in a play but he was received with an involuntary applause, not of hands only, for those may be, and have often been, partially prostituted and bespoken, but by a general laughter, which the very sight of him provoked, and nature could not resist; yet the louder the laugh the graver was his look upon it; and sure the ridiculous solemnity of his features were enough to have set a whole bench of bishops into a titter, could he have been honoured (may it be no offence to suppose it) with such grave and right reverend auditors. In the ludicrous distresses which by the laws of comedy folly is often involved in, he sunk into such a mixture of piteous pusillanimity, and a consternation so ruefully ridiculous and inconsolable, that when he had shook you to a fatigue of laughter, it became a moot point whether you ought not to have pitied him. When he debated any matter by himself, he would shut up his mouth with a dumb, studious pout, and roll his full eye into such a vacant amazement, such a palpable ignorance of what to think of it, that his silent perplexity (which would sometimes hold him several minutes) gave your imagination as full content as the most absurd thing he could say upon it."