🔗 Share this article

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

The FBI trainee, a rookie, navigates a corridor of cells arriving at Dr. Lecter's transparent prison. There he stands, appearing as an animated death's head exuding demonic evil, eerily immobile wearing a snug prisoner's blue outfit. He remains motionless until the moment he lunges at the barrier, making that unforgettable spitting-growling noise. Countless documentaries on serial killers have since shown that actual serial killers tend to be quite dull, with nothing resembling the actor's commanding screen presence.

Hopkins was hardly an unknown at the time he got that Oscar-winning role in the 1991 thriller back in 1989: he was already established, but a legend emerged. His portrayal of Lecter drew influence, the actor happily remembers in his latest book, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on the Soviet leader based on his daughter's accounts, and on his own strictly demanding drama teacher Christopher Fettes. Additionally, there existed a parent-child dynamic within the narrative; a sore point for Hopkins, who also describes how his King Lear was unknowingly shaped by an agonised guilt about Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his failed first union in 1966 to his first wife, who disliked his absences and his drinking habits.

The memoir's title is derived from an old wartime photo of Hopkins as a toddler on the beach with his dad – the boy who perhaps believed he would never do OK. He felt confused, shy and fragile youth raised in Port Talbot, son of Richard Arthur Hopkins, the standout secondary character in the narrative: a pastry chef and man's man, a straightforward talker who detested the Bible-punching hypocrites at the church and didn't believe in showing his emotions, but had a streak of nostalgic, emotional sentimentality. It was Hopkins Sr who deeply disliked the way they had to go humbly to affluent family members including Auntie Patty, whose husband knew the famous Bevan and was able to secure the young Anthony into a posh school: “Since they are extremely wealthy!” he exclaims in the car on the way there. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Bloody rubbish, that's what it is!”

The humility worked, temporarily. He was a poor student in his new institution. But one day in an English lesson he needed to deliver the verse by John Masefield known as The West Wind – without seeing it first – and that voice came to life; he amazed the instructor and the other boys. He reasonably claims that poetry, on its own, started his career. This, and joining the YMCA theater group. Surprisingly, he exited school without much hope, went into acting, and amazingly to his parents, was performing alongside Laurence Olivier at the Old Vic in just ten years. He more or less did it on his own, although in those days scholarships existed for drama school – an opportunity for actors from humble backgrounds. His father was always amazed of Anthony's global success: on asking his son to perform the Yorick monologue from the play Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then went into another room and wept openly.

Concerning the volatile, stubborn individual, he left the National Theatre out of frustration – to Olivier's profound dismay and disapproval – but fortunately found a great TV role as a potential war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which paved the way to roles such as in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a successful acting career on screen, which he liked more compared to stage acting. He stopped drinking back in 1975 once a notorious drinker, and managed to live into his later years to achieve remarkable acting, such as Lecter, the servant Stevens in The Remains of the Day featuring Emma Thompson and the old man with dementia in his film The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the latter half of his autobiography his personality becomes more opaque, more studied. Certain stories aren't entirely successful. He remembers being taken out to lunch by his co-star in the film Nixon, the esteemed thespian Paul Sorvino, who intended to inform him his acting as Nixon was falling short. Was this the moment for Anthony to gain insight advice from the renowned performer of the Goodfellas fame? Not really. Anthony appears to agree with Stone's dismissal of Sorvino as driven out of envy. Really?

He often portrays the no-nonsense, practical performer who believes it's your duty to arrive punctually, remember every crew member's name and proceed with the work. Quite so. However, he also describes confronting an obnoxious director who'd made a young extra cry: “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 but possibly not the combativeness that accompanied it. An actor of his caliber must know the lines about Kent from Cornwall from the play Lear: “He is incapable of flattery! An honest mind and plain – he is compelled to be honest!”

Hopkins concludes his book with an extensive addendum composed simply