🔗 Share this article

It stands as the greatest entrance in movie lore – and he remains utterly motionless.

A young FBI agent, just starting out, must walk a corridor of cells arriving at the notorious doctor's transparent prison. There he stands, his face resembling a skeletal visage filled with sinister intent, eerily immobile in his form-fitting blue prison jumpsuit. He doesn't move before suddenly he propels himself toward the window, producing that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. Numerous documentaries on serial killers have since demonstrated that actual serial killers tend to be quite dull, lacking anything like Anthony Hopkins's commanding screen presence.

He was not unrecognized at the time he got his Academy Award-winning part in the iconic film back in 1989: he was already established, but a legend was cemented. His portrayal of Lecter was based, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in his latest book, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on the Soviet leader based on his daughter's accounts, as well as his rigorously precise Rada tutor Christopher Fettes. The scenes also contained a father-daughter dimension in these moments; a sore point for the actor, who recounts how his King Lear was unknowingly shaped by deep-seated remorse regarding his daughter Abigail, his distant daughter from his initial marriage back in 1966 with Petronella Barker, who was angered by his time away and his alcohol use.

The book's name comes from an old wartime photo of Hopkins as a toddler playing on the sand with his father – the kid who maybe thought he couldn't make it. He felt confused, lonely, vulnerable little boy hailing from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the standout secondary character in this story: a pastry chef and man's man, a straightforward talker who detested the religious hypocrites of the chapel and didn't believe in showing his emotions, but had a streak of wistful, tearful romanticism. It was Hopkins Sr who was angered by how they were forced begging to their rich relatives including Auntie Patty, whose husband knew Nye Bevan and helped enroll young Anthony into a prestigious academy: “Because they're bloody rich!” he raves in the car on the way there. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The pleading was effective, temporarily. He was a poor student at the prestigious school. Then, during in a literature class he was required to perform John Masefield's poem known as The West Wind – without seeing it first – and that voice came to life; he amazed the instructor and his classmates. He reasonably claims that verse, by itself, launched him. This, and joining the YMCA theater group. Surprisingly, he exited school with low prospects, entered the acting world, and amazingly to his parents, was acting with Laurence Olivier at the Old Vic in just ten years. He accomplished it mostly independently, though at that time scholarships existed to go to Rada – a path to success for actors from humble backgrounds. His dad remained in awe of Anthony's global success: on asking his son to recite the Yorick speech from Shakespeare's Hamlet, Richard listened carefully and then left the room and wept openly.

Regarding the fiery, strong-willed son, he quit the National Theatre company in a moment of anger – causing Olivier's regret and disapproval – but stumbled upon an excellent television part as a suspected war criminal in the series QB VII, which eventually resulted to parts like that in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey on screen, that he favored compared to stage acting. He gave up alcohol during the mid-70s once a notorious drinker, and so survived into his later years to achieve remarkable acting, like Hannibal Lecter, the butler Stevens in the film The Remains of the Day alongside Emma Thompson and the senior with memory loss in the movie The Father – his second Oscar.

During the second part of the memoir his character seems more elusive, more studied. A few tales fall a bit flat. He recalls having lunch by his co-star in Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Paul, who intended to inform him his performance as Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the chance for Anthony to gain insight advice from the renowned performer from Goodfellas? Not exactly. Hopkins seems to go along with Stone's rejection that Sorvino was acting by jealousy. Is that so?

He often portrays the tough, down-to-earth professional actor who thinks it is one's responsibility to be on time, know all the crew's names and do the job. Quite so. However, he also describes standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who caused a young extra to weep: “Say sorry to her! And acquire some decency. Should you ever act that way around me, I'll rearrange your face! He appears to be someone who gave up drink but maybe not the belligerence that went with it. A classical performer like Hopkins must know Cornwall's speech regarding Kent from the play Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! An honest mind and plain – he always tells the truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with a lengthy appendix composed simply