🔗 Share this article

Many consider it the most memorable appearance in film history – yet the actor stays completely still.

A young FBI agent, just starting out, proceeds down the line of detention units arriving at Dr. Lecter's reinforced glass enclosure. There he stands, his face resembling an animated death's head exuding demonic evil, eerily immobile in his form-fitting prisoner's blue outfit. He stands frozen before suddenly he propels himself against the glass, making that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. Numerous real-crime films have since shown that real-life murderers are often very boring, far from Hopkins' captivating film persona.

Hopkins was hardly a newcomer when he landed the part that won him an Oscar in The Silence of the Lambs during the late 80s: it wasn't his debut, but rather a megastar was cemented. His Dr. Lecter drew influence, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in this new autobiography, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Joseph Stalin as recalled by his daughter, and also from his rigorously precise acting coach his mentor Fettes. The scenes also contained a parent-child dynamic to these scenes; a sore point for the actor, who also describes how his King Lear was unknowingly shaped by painful regret about Abigail, the estranged daughter from his failed first union back in 1966 to his first wife, who disliked him being away and drinking.

The memoir's title is derived from an historical picture of Anthony as a small child playing on the sand with his father – the child who might have felt he would never do OK. He was a bewildered, lonely, vulnerable little boy hailing from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the scene-stealing supporting player here: a pastry chef and a tough individual, a straightforward talker who loathed the Bible-punching hypocrites of the chapel and refused to displaying emotion, yet possessed a touch of wistful, tearful romanticism. His father who deeply disliked the necessity of going humbly to their wealthy relations including Auntie Patty, whose husband knew the politician Nye Bevan and helped enroll the young Anthony into a posh school: “Since they are extremely wealthy!” he shouts during the car ride. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The pleading was effective, temporarily. Anthony struggled academically at the prestigious school. However, one day in a literature class he had to recite the verse by John Masefield titled The West Wind – without prior preparation – and his voice awakened; he amazed the instructor and his classmates. He convincingly states that verse, by itself, propelled him forward. This, along with enrolling in the YMCA theater group. Surprisingly, he exited school without much hope, pursued acting, and to the astonishment of his parents, was performing with the great Olivier at the famous theater in just ten years. He accomplished it mostly independently, although in those days scholarships existed for drama school – a path to success for working-class actors. His dad remained in awe with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: on asking his son to recite the Yorick speech from Hamlet, Richard listened carefully and then retreated to another room and began crying.

Regarding the fiery, bloody-minded son, he departed the theatrical troupe in a fit of pique – much to Olivier's disappointment and criticism – but stumbled upon a memorable TV character as a suspected war criminal in the series QB VII, which eventually resulted to parts like that in the film The Elephant Man and a successful acting career on screen, which he liked more compared to stage acting. He stopped drinking during the mid-70s once a notorious drinker, and thus made it into his later years to achieve remarkable acting, such as Lecter, the servant 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 Academy Award.

In the later sections of the book he appears more reserved, more studied. A few tales aren't entirely successful. He remembers being taken out to lunch alongside his cast mate in the film Nixon, the much-respected actor Paul Sorvino, who intended to inform him his portrayal of Nixon wasn't working. Was this the moment for him to absorb advice from the renowned performer from Goodfellas? Hardly. Hopkins seems to go along with the director's criticism of Sorvino as driven by jealousy. Truly?

He often portrays the grounded, serious thespian who believes you must to be on time, learn everyone's name on set and do the job. Indeed. But he also recounts confronting an obnoxious director who caused a young extra to weep: “Apologise to her! And learn some manners. Should you ever act that way near me, I'll alter your appearance!” Hopkins sounds like an individual who stopped drinking but maybe not the belligerence that accompanied it. A classical performer like Hopkins must know Cornwall's lines on Kent from Lear: “He is incapable of flattery! An honest mind and plain – he must speak truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with a lengthy appendix composed simply