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Widely regarded as the most memorable appearance in movie lore – yet the actor stays without moving a muscle.

A young FBI agent, a rookie, navigates a row of prison cells arriving at Hannibal Lecter's secure glass tank. There he stands, his face resembling an animated death's head exuding demonic evil, eerily immobile wearing a snug blue prison jumpsuit. He remains motionless before suddenly he throws himself toward the window, emitting that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. Countless true-crime documentaries have since shown that actual serial killers are usually uninteresting, with nothing resembling Hopkins' captivating film persona.

Hopkins was hardly unrecognized upon receiving that Oscar-winning role in The Silence of the Lambs back in 1989: it wasn't his debut, but rather a megastar was cemented. His Dr. Lecter drew influence, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in his latest book, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on the Soviet leader according to his daughter's memories, as well as his strictly demanding Rada tutor his instructor Fettes. The scenes also contained a parent-child dynamic in these moments; a sore point for Hopkins, who further explains how his portrayal of Lear was unknowingly shaped by painful regret concerning Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his initial marriage back in 1966 to his first wife, who was angered by his absences and his alcohol use.

The title originates from a vintage war-era photograph of Anthony as a small child with his father at the seaside – the boy who perhaps believed he couldn't make it. He felt confused, shy and fragile youth from Port Talbot, son of Richard Arthur Hopkins, the scene-stealing supporting player here: a bread-maker and a tough individual, a straightforward talker who detested the sanctimonious churchgoers of the chapel and refused to displaying emotion, but also exhibited dreamy, sentimental tenderness. It was Hopkins Sr who deeply disliked the necessity of going humbly to affluent family members such as Aunt Patty, who was connected to the politician Nye Bevan and helped enroll the young Anthony into a prestigious academy: “Due to their immense riches!” he exclaims during the car ride. “We are all expecting handouts! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The humility worked, for a time. Hopkins was a hopeless student at his new school. Then, during during an English class he needed to deliver John Masefield's poem known as The West Wind – without seeing it first – and his talent emerged; he shocked the educator and the other boys. He reasonably claims that poems, alone, propelled him forward. This, and joining the dramatic society at the YMCA. Remarkably, he left school without much hope, pursued acting, and shocking his family, was acting alongside Laurence Olivier at the famous theater in under a decade. He more or less did it on his own, though at that time there were grants to go to Rada – a path to success for working-class actors. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed of Anthony's global success: upon requesting his son to recite the Yorick speech from the play Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then left the room and burst into tears.

Concerning the volatile, stubborn individual, he left the National Theatre in a fit of pique – causing Olivier's regret and criticism – but stumbled upon a memorable TV character as a potential war criminal in Leon Uris's QB VII, which led indirectly to parts like that in Lynch's The Elephant Man and a thriving starry career on screen, which he liked more to the stage. He stopped drinking in 1975 having been a hell-raising alcoholic, and so survived through midlife to achieve remarkable acting, like Hannibal Lecter, the servant Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson with Emma Thompson and the senior with memory loss in The Father – his second Oscar.

In the latter half of the book his personality becomes more opaque, more calculated. Certain stories fall a bit flat. He remembers being taken out to lunch by his co-star in Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Sorvino, who intended to inform him his acting as Nixon was falling short. Was this the chance for him to absorb something from the legendary star of the Goodfellas fame? Not exactly. Hopkins seems to go along with Stone's rejection of Sorvino as driven due to resentment. Truly?

He repeatedly performs the no-nonsense, practical performer who thinks it is one's responsibility to arrive punctually, learn everyone's name on set and get on with it. Indeed. But he also recounts confronting an obnoxious director who caused a young extra to weep: “Apologise to her! And develop some respect. You ever do that again around me, I'll rearrange your face! Anthony comes across as an individual who stopped drinking yet perhaps not the aggression that came with it. A Shakespearean like him is aware of Cornwall's lines on Kent from Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! A straightforward and sincere nature – he must speak truth!”

Hopkins concludes his book with a lengthy appendix composed simply