🔗 Share this article

Widely regarded as the greatest introduction in movie lore – while he stands completely still.

A young FBI agent, a rookie, navigates the line of detention units arriving at Dr. Lecter's secure glass tank. There he stands, appearing as a skeletal visage exuding demonic evil, unnervingly still clad in a tight blue prison jumpsuit. He stands frozen until the moment he throws himself toward the window, emitting that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. A multitude of true-crime documentaries have since revealed that real-life murderers are usually uninteresting, with nothing resembling Anthony Hopkins's powerful on-screen charisma.

He wasn't exactly a newcomer upon receiving that Oscar-winning role in The Silence of the Lambs in 1989: a star wasn't born, but a legend emerged. His Dr. Lecter drew influence, the actor happily remembers in this new autobiography, on the classic Dracula, on Joseph Stalin according to his daughter's memories, and also from his rigorously precise drama teacher Christopher Fettes. There was also a father-daughter dimension to these scenes; a difficult topic for Hopkins, who also describes how his King Lear was unknowingly shaped by an agonised guilt concerning Abigail, the estranged daughter from his initial marriage during the 60s to Petronella Barker, who disliked him being away and his drinking habits.

The memoir's title is derived from a vintage war-era photograph 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, isolated and sensitive child raised in Port Talbot, son of Richard Arthur Hopkins, the scene-stealing supporting player in the narrative: a baker and a traditional male, a plain speaker who despised the sanctimonious churchgoers of the chapel and avoided displaying emotion, but had a streak of dreamy, sentimental tenderness. It was Hopkins Sr who was angered by the necessity of going humbly to affluent family members such as Aunt Patty, whose husband knew the politician Nye Bevan and was able to secure the young Anthony into a posh school: “Because they're bloody rich!” he exclaims in the car on the way there. “We are all expecting handouts! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The humility worked, for a time. He was a poor student at his new school. Then, during in an English lesson he had to recite John Masefield's poem The West Wind – without prior preparation – and his voice awakened; he amazed the instructor and the other boys. He says quite plausibly that poetry, on its own, launched him. This, along with enrolling in the YMCA drama club. Surprisingly, he exited school without much hope, pursued acting, and amazingly to his parents, was acting with the great Olivier at the renowned Old Vic in just ten years. He more or less did it on his own, though at that time scholarships existed for drama school – a way up for performers from modest means. His father was always amazed by his son's international fame: upon requesting his son to perform the Yorick monologue from Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then went into another room and burst into tears.

Concerning the volatile, stubborn individual, he left the National Theatre out of frustration – much to Olivier's disappointment and criticism – but stumbled upon a great TV role as a potential war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which led indirectly to characters including in Lynch's The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey on screen, that he favored to the stage. He stopped drinking during the mid-70s after being a heavy drinker, and thus made it into middle age to execute great performances, like Hannibal Lecter, the butler Stevens in the film The Remains of the Day alongside Emma Thompson and the senior with memory loss in his film The Father – his second Academy Award.

In the later sections of the memoir his character seems more elusive, more studied. Some of the anecdotage fall a bit flat. He recalls going out for lunch by his co-star in the film Nixon, the much-respected actor Paul, who intended to inform him his portrayal of Nixon wasn't working. Was this the opportunity for Anthony to gain insight a lesson from the famous actor from Goodfellas? Not really. He tends to concur with Stone's dismissal of Sorvino as being motivated by jealousy. Is that so?

He consistently acts as the grounded, serious thespian who believes you must to get there on time, remember every crew member's name and do the job. Absolutely. But he also recounts facing a rude director who'd made a young extra cry: “Say sorry to her! And acquire some decency. You ever do that again in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! Hopkins sounds like an individual who stopped drinking but possibly not the combativeness that came with it. An actor of his caliber must know Cornwall's lines on Kent from Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! A straightforward and sincere nature – he must speak truth!”

Hopkins concludes his book with an extensive addendum composed simply