We interviewed Nathan at one of London’s most prestigious West End theatres. He was the lead in the venue’s big budget autumn play, and was enjoying very good reviews. It was only the latest accolade in an illustrious acting career. Now in his mid-40s, Nathan’s CV is littered with acclaimed roles on stage and screen. He has played title roles for the Royal Shakespeare Company, appeared in Hollywood blockbusters and fronted BAFTA award-winning television. Recently profiled in the culture pages of a national newspaper, Nathan is celebrated as a rare and prodigious talent. He himself is more modest. Any success, he tells us, is down to “just working incredibly hard” and “making good decisions”. Particularly crucial, he notes, has been turning down acting projects that he hasn’t believed in: “No job is worth sacrificing yourself for,” he tells us.

Contrast Nathan with Jim, also an actor and also in his 40s. We interviewed Jim a few weeks later at another top London theatre. Jim, however, was not starring inside. In fact, he wasn’t working at all, and hadn’t for some six months. Yet Jim also had an impressive CV. Through his 20s and 30s he had worked consistently in television and theatre and a few years ago had accepted a prominent part in a television soap. But after four years his character was axed and, in the intervening years, he had struggled to re-adjust.

“I’ve just been going up for smaller and smaller parts, for less and less money,” he says, explaining that he has recently decided to leave the profession: “The writing is on the wall. But it still hurts because … because it sort of means I’ve failed.”

Jim’s story is not particularly unusual. Acting is widely considered one of the most precarious and competitive professions in the world. Comparing these two men’s careers at face value, then, many people might come to the conclusion that Nathan is simply a more talented actor. Or has worked harder. Or has made better decisions.

There may be some truth to this. But such routine judgements also reflect the fact that the explanatory tool that most reach for when making sense of who gets ahead is ‘meritocracy’. As we explained in the Introduction to this book, there is much ambiguity over the meaning and definition of ‘merit’.