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Widely regarded as the most iconic entrance in cinematic history – and he remains completely still.

The FBI trainee, new to the job, must walk a corridor of cells until she reaches the notorious doctor's secure glass tank. The man is present, appearing as a living skull filled with sinister intent, unnervingly still in his form-fitting blue inmate uniform. He remains motionless before suddenly he lunges toward the window, producing that unforgettable spitting-growling noise. Numerous documentaries on serial killers have since demonstrated that real-life murderers are often very boring, far from Anthony Hopkins's commanding screen presence.

He wasn't exactly a newcomer at the time he got that Oscar-winning role in the 1991 thriller in 1989: he was already established, instead, a superstar was cemented. His Dr. Lecter was based, Hopkins notes with amusement in his latest book, from Lugosi's Dracula, on Joseph Stalin as recalled by his daughter, and on his own icily exacting drama teacher Christopher Fettes. Additionally, there existed a father-daughter dimension within the narrative; a sore point for Anthony, who also describes how his Lear was unknowingly shaped by deep-seated remorse concerning Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his initial marriage in 1966 to Petronella Barker, who resented his absences and drinking.

The memoir's title is derived from an historical picture of a young Hopkins with his father at the seaside – the boy who perhaps believed he couldn't make it. He felt confused, lonely, vulnerable little boy from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the memorable figure in the narrative: a baker and a tough individual, a direct communicator who loathed the sanctimonious churchgoers in their community and refused to showing his emotions, yet possessed a touch of dreamy, sentimental tenderness. His father who was angered by the way they had to go humbly to their rich relatives including Auntie Patty, who was connected to the famous Bevan and could get the young Anthony into a prestigious academy: “Since they are extremely wealthy!” he exclaims during the car ride. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The pleading was effective, for a while. Anthony struggled academically in his new institution. Then, during in an English lesson he had to recite the verse by John Masefield titled The West Wind – sight unseen – and that voice came to life; he stunned the teacher and the other boys. He reasonably claims that poetry, on its own, started his career. Combined with participating in the dramatic society at the YMCA. Remarkably, he left school without much hope, pursued acting, and to the astonishment of his parents, was performing with the great Olivier at the renowned Old Vic within 10 years. He accomplished it mostly independently, although in those days there were grants to go to Rada – an opportunity for working-class actors. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed by his son's international fame: when he asked Anthony to perform the Yorick monologue from the play Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then retreated to another room and wept openly.

Regarding the fiery, bloody-minded son, he quit the National Theatre company in a fit of pique – to Olivier's profound dismay and criticism – but stumbled upon a great TV role playing an alleged war criminal in Leon Uris's QB VII, which paved the way to characters including in the film The Elephant Man and a thriving starry career in cinema, which he preferred to the stage. He stopped drinking back in 1975 once a notorious drinker, and thus made it into middle age to execute great performances, like Hannibal Lecter, the servant Stevens in The Remains of the Day with Emma Thompson and the old man with dementia in the movie The Father – his second Academy Award.

During the second part of the book his personality becomes more opaque, more deliberate. Certain stories doesn't quite come off. He remembers being taken out to lunch alongside his cast mate in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Sorvino, who wanted to tell him his performance as Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the moment for him to absorb a lesson from the famous actor of the Goodfellas fame? Hardly. He tends to concur with Stone's rejection of Sorvino as being motivated due to resentment. Truly?

He repeatedly performs the tough, down-to-earth professional actor who maintains you must to arrive punctually, learn everyone's name on set and get on with it. Indeed. Yet he also tells facing a rude director who caused a young extra to weep: “Say sorry to her! And acquire some decency. If you ever repeat that in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! Hopkins sounds like someone who gave up drink yet perhaps not the aggression that came with it. An actor of his caliber is aware of the lines about Kent from Cornwall in King Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! An honest mind and plain – he must speak truth!”

Hopkins concludes his book with a lengthy appendix composed simply