🔗 Share this article

It stands as the greatest entrance in film history – while he stands completely still.

The FBI trainee, a rookie, navigates a row of prison cells finally encountering Hannibal Lecter's transparent prison. There he stands, with features like an animated death's head exuding demonic evil, chillingly static wearing a snug blue inmate uniform. He doesn't move before suddenly he lunges against the glass, making that unforgettable spitting-growling noise. Countless real-crime films have since demonstrated that actual serial killers are often very boring, with nothing resembling Hopkins' powerful on-screen charisma.

He wasn't exactly a newcomer upon receiving that Oscar-winning role in the iconic film in 1989: he was already established, but rather a megastar was forged. His portrayal of Lecter was based, the actor happily remembers in his latest book, from Lugosi's Dracula, on the Soviet leader as recalled by his daughter, and also from his rigorously precise Rada tutor Christopher Fettes. The scenes also contained a father-daughter dimension to these scenes; a difficult topic for the actor, who recounts how his King Lear was subconsciously influenced by painful regret regarding his daughter Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his failed first union back in 1966 to his first wife, who was angered by him being away and his drinking habits.

The book's name comes from a vintage war-era photograph of Hopkins as a toddler playing on the sand with his father – the child who might have felt he wouldn't succeed. He appeared lost, isolated and sensitive child from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the memorable figure in the narrative: a bread-maker and man's man, a straightforward talker who loathed the sanctimonious churchgoers at the church and didn't believe in displaying emotion, yet possessed a touch of dreamy, sentimental tenderness. It was Hopkins Sr who deeply disliked how they were forced humbly to affluent family members like Auntie Patty, whose husband knew the politician Nye Bevan and could get Anthony as a boy into an elite school: “Because they're bloody rich!” he raves during the car ride. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The grovelling paid off, temporarily. Hopkins was a hopeless student at the prestigious school. Then, during in a literature class he was required to perform the verse by John Masefield The West Wind – without seeing it first – and his voice awakened; he amazed the instructor and his classmates. He reasonably claims that poetry, on its own, started his career. This, and joining the YMCA drama club. Surprisingly, he exited school a no-hoper, entered the acting world, and to the astonishment of his parents, was on stage alongside Laurence Olivier at the renowned Old Vic in just ten years. He more or less did it on his own, even though back then there were grants to go to Rada – a path to success for actors from humble backgrounds. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed of Anthony's global success: upon requesting his son to perform the Yorick monologue from the play Hamlet, Richard listened carefully and then retreated to another room and wept openly.

As for the hot-tempered, stubborn individual, he left the National Theatre out of frustration – much to Olivier's disappointment and criticism – but stumbled upon a memorable TV character as a suspected war criminal in Leon Uris's QB VII, which led indirectly to roles such as in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey on screen, which he liked more to the stage. And he quit booze back in 1975 once a notorious drinker, and thus made it into middle age to execute great performances, including Lecter, the servant Stevens in the film The Remains of the Day with Emma Thompson and the senior with memory loss in The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the later sections of his autobiography his personality becomes more opaque, more deliberate. Certain stories doesn't quite come off. He mentions being taken out to lunch with his fellow actor in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Paul, who intended to inform him his performance as Nixon was falling short. Was this the opportunity for Hopkins to learn something from the legendary star of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Not exactly. Anthony appears to agree with Stone's rejection that Sorvino was acting by jealousy. Really?

He consistently acts as the no-nonsense, practical performer who believes it is one's responsibility to be on time, remember every crew member's name and get on with it. Absolutely. But he also recounts facing a rude director who'd made a young extra cry: “Apologise to her! And learn some manners. Should you ever act that way around me, I'll rearrange your face! Hopkins sounds like an individual who stopped drinking yet perhaps not the aggression that went with it. An actor of his caliber surely knows Cornwall's lines on Kent in King Lear: “He is incapable of flattery! A truthful and simple spirit – he always tells the truth!”

Hopkins concludes his book with a detailed supplement composed simply