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It stands as the greatest entrance in cinematic history – yet the actor stays utterly motionless.

A young FBI agent, a rookie, proceeds down the line of detention units finally encountering Dr. Lecter's transparent prison. He is positioned, with features like an animated death's head filled with sinister intent, unnervingly still in his form-fitting blue prison jumpsuit. He doesn't move right up until he propels himself at the barrier, making that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. A multitude of documentaries on serial killers have since revealed that actual serial killers are usually uninteresting, with nothing resembling Hopkins' commanding screen presence.

He was not unrecognized when he landed that Oscar-winning role in the 1991 thriller in 1989: he was already established, but rather a megastar was forged. The character of Hannibal was based, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in his recent memoir, from Lugosi's Dracula, on the Soviet leader based on his daughter's accounts, and also from his icily exacting Rada tutor his mentor Fettes. There was also a father-daughter dimension within the narrative; a sore point for Hopkins, who also describes how his King Lear was subconsciously influenced by painful regret concerning Abigail, his distant daughter from his failed first union during the 60s to his first wife, who was angered by his absences and his alcohol use.

The memoir's title is derived from an historical picture of Hopkins as a toddler playing on the sand with his father – the boy who perhaps believed he couldn't make it. He felt confused, shy and fragile youth raised in Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the memorable figure in the narrative: a baker and a tough individual, a plain speaker who despised the sanctimonious churchgoers of the chapel and didn't believe in showing his emotions, but had a streak of dreamy, sentimental tenderness. His father who deeply disliked the necessity of going humbly to their wealthy relations like Auntie Patty, who was connected to the politician Nye Bevan and helped enroll young Anthony into a prestigious academy: “Because they're bloody rich!” he raves in the car on the way there. “We are all expecting handouts! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The pleading was effective, for a while. Hopkins was a hopeless student at his new school. Then, during in a literature class he was required to perform the verse by John Masefield known as The West Wind – sight unseen – and that voice came to life; he stunned the teacher and the other boys. He reasonably claims that poems, alone, propelled him forward. This, along with enrolling in the YMCA drama club. Surprisingly, he exited school without much hope, pursued acting, and amazingly to his parents, was on stage with the great Olivier at the renowned Old Vic within 10 years. He accomplished it mostly independently, even though back then scholarships existed for drama school – an opportunity for actors from humble backgrounds. His father was always amazed by his son's international fame: upon requesting his son to deliver the Yorick lines from Shakespeare's Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then left the room and wept openly.

Concerning the volatile, stubborn individual, he quit the National Theatre company in a moment of anger – much to Olivier's disappointment and criticism – but fortunately found a great TV role playing an alleged war criminal in Leon Uris's QB VII, which eventually resulted to roles such as in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a thriving starry career in cinema, that he favored compared to stage acting. And he quit booze in 1975 after being a heavy drinker, and managed to live through midlife to achieve remarkable acting, like Hannibal Lecter, the servant Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson alongside Emma Thompson and the senior with memory loss in The Father – his second Academy Award.

In the latter half of his autobiography he appears more reserved, more studied. Some of the anecdotage aren't entirely successful. He remembers being taken out to lunch with his fellow actor in Stone's Nixon, the highly regarded performer Paul Sorvino, who sought to advise him his portrayal of Nixon was falling short. Was this the opportunity for Anthony to gain insight advice from the renowned performer of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Hardly. Anthony appears to agree with Stone's dismissal that Sorvino was acting out of envy. Really?

He often portrays the grounded, serious thespian who believes it's your duty to get there on time, learn everyone's name on set and do the job. Absolutely. However, he also describes standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who caused a young extra to weep: “Say sorry to her! And develop some respect. You ever do that again around me, I'll rearrange your face! Hopkins sounds like someone who gave up drink but possibly not the combativeness that came with it. A classical performer like Hopkins must know Cornwall's speech regarding Kent from the play Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! An honest mind and plain – he always tells the truth!”

He finishes his autobiography with a detailed supplement composed simply