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Widely regarded as the most iconic entrance in film history – and he remains without moving a muscle.

The FBI trainee, just starting out, proceeds down a corridor of cells finally encountering the notorious doctor's secure glass tank. The man is present, his face resembling an animated death's head radiating satanic malice, eerily immobile wearing a snug blue prison jumpsuit. He remains motionless right up until he propels himself toward the window, making that unforgettable spitting-growling noise. A multitude of documentaries on serial killers have since revealed that real-life murderers tend to be quite dull, lacking anything like the actor's powerful on-screen charisma.

Hopkins was hardly unrecognized upon receiving the part that won him an Oscar in the 1991 thriller back in 1989: a star wasn't born, but a legend was forged. His portrayal of Lecter was inspired, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in his recent memoir, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on the Soviet leader based on his daughter's accounts, and also from his rigorously precise Rada tutor Christopher Fettes. The scenes also contained a paternal-filial aspect within the narrative; a sore point for Hopkins, who also describes how his King Lear was unknowingly shaped by an agonised guilt concerning Abigail, his distant daughter from his failed first union back in 1966 with Petronella Barker, who disliked his absences and drinking.

The book's name comes from an old wartime photo of Anthony as a small child with his father at the seaside – the kid who maybe thought he couldn't make it. He appeared lost, shy and fragile youth raised in Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the memorable figure in this story: a bread-maker and a tough individual, a straightforward talker who loathed the religious hypocrites at the church and didn't believe in showing his emotions, but had a streak of dreamy, sentimental tenderness. It was Hopkins Sr who furiously resented the way they had to go begging to their rich relatives like Auntie Patty, who was connected to the politician Nye Bevan and was able to secure Anthony as a boy into a posh school: “Due to their immense riches!” he exclaims while traveling there. “We are all expecting handouts! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The grovelling paid off, temporarily. Anthony struggled academically at his new school. Then, during in a literature class he had to recite the verse by John Masefield known as The West Wind – without seeing it first – and his talent emerged; he shocked the educator and his classmates. He reasonably claims that poems, alone, launched him. Combined with participating in the dramatic society at the YMCA. Surprisingly, he exited school a no-hoper, pursued acting, and to the astonishment of his parents, was acting with Laurence Olivier at the Old Vic within 10 years. He accomplished it mostly independently, even though back then scholarships existed for drama school – a way up for performers from modest means. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed by his son's international fame: when he asked Anthony to recite the Yorick speech from Shakespeare's Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then went into another room and burst into tears.

Concerning the volatile, stubborn individual, he quit the National Theatre company out of frustration – to Olivier's profound dismay and displeasure – but fortunately found a great TV role as a potential war criminal in the series QB VII, which led indirectly to parts like that in Lynch's The Elephant Man and a successful acting career on screen, that he favored to the stage. He stopped drinking in 1975 once a notorious drinker, and so survived into middle age to execute great performances, like Hannibal Lecter, the steward Stevens in The Remains of the Day with Emma Thompson and the senior with memory loss in The Father – his second Oscar.

In the later sections of the book his character seems more elusive, more studied. Certain stories doesn't quite come off. He remembers having lunch with his fellow actor in Stone's Nixon, the much-respected actor Paul Sorvino, who wanted to tell him his acting as Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the opportunity for him to absorb something from the legendary star of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Not really. Anthony appears to agree with the director's criticism of Sorvino as being motivated due to resentment. Truly?

He consistently acts as the no-nonsense, practical performer who believes it is one's responsibility to arrive punctually, know all the crew's names and get on with it. Indeed. But he also recounts facing a rude director who caused a young extra to weep: “Apologize to that girl! And acquire some decency. If you ever repeat that around me, I'll rearrange your face! Hopkins sounds like a person who quit alcohol yet perhaps not the aggression that came with it. An actor of his caliber is aware of Cornwall's speech regarding Kent in King Lear: “He is incapable of flattery! A truthful and simple spirit – he always tells the truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with a detailed supplement composed simply