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

Clarice Starling, a rookie, proceeds down the line of detention units arriving at Hannibal Lecter's secure glass tank. He is positioned, appearing as an animated death's head radiating satanic malice, chillingly static wearing a snug blue prison jumpsuit. He stands frozen until the moment he lunges toward the window, emitting that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. Numerous real-crime films have since revealed that actual serial killers are often very boring, lacking anything like the actor's powerful on-screen charisma.

He was not an unknown upon receiving his Academy Award-winning part in The Silence of the Lambs back in 1989: it wasn't his debut, instead, a superstar emerged. His Dr. Lecter was inspired, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in this new autobiography, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Stalin according to his daughter's memories, and also from his strictly demanding Rada tutor his instructor Fettes. Additionally, there existed a paternal-filial aspect in these moments; a painful subject for the actor, who recounts how his Lear was unknowingly shaped by deep-seated remorse about Abigail, the estranged daughter from his initial marriage in 1966 to Petronella Barker, who resented him being away and his drinking habits.

The book's name comes from a vintage war-era photograph of Hopkins as a toddler on the beach with his dad – the kid who maybe thought he wouldn't succeed. He was a bewildered, isolated and sensitive child hailing from Port Talbot, the child of Richard Hopkins, the standout secondary character in the narrative: a baker and a tough individual, a direct communicator who detested the Bible-punching hypocrites in their community and refused to expressing his feelings, but also exhibited wistful, tearful romanticism. Richard Hopkins who deeply disliked how they were forced cap-in-hand to their rich relatives such as Aunt Patty, whose husband knew the famous Bevan and was able to secure the young Anthony into an elite school: “Since they are extremely wealthy!” he shouts in the car on the way there. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The pleading was effective, for a while. Anthony struggled academically at the prestigious school. But one day in an English lesson he was required to perform the verse by John Masefield titled The West Wind – sight unseen – and that voice came to life; he shocked the educator and his classmates. He says quite plausibly that verse, by itself, started his career. This, and joining the YMCA theater group. Notably, he graduated without much hope, entered the acting world, and amazingly to his parents, was performing with Laurence Olivier at the renowned Old Vic in just ten years. He largely achieved it alone, although in those days financial aid was available to attend Rada – a way up for working-class actors. His dad remained in awe with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: upon requesting his son to perform the Yorick monologue from Shakespeare's Hamlet, Richard listened carefully and then went into another room and wept openly.

As for the hot-tempered, stubborn individual, he departed the theatrical troupe in a moment of anger – to Olivier's profound dismay and criticism – but stumbled upon a great TV role playing an alleged war criminal in Leon Uris's QB VII, which eventually resulted to characters including in the film The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey in cinema, that he favored to the stage. And he quit booze during the mid-70s once a notorious drinker, and so survived through midlife to execute great performances, like Hannibal Lecter, the steward Stevens in The Remains of the Day featuring Emma Thompson and the old man with dementia in The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the later sections of the memoir his character seems more elusive, more deliberate. A few tales doesn't quite come off. He mentions being taken out to lunch with his fellow actor in the film Nixon, the much-respected actor Paul Sorvino, who sought to advise him his performance as Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the moment for Hopkins to learn a lesson from the famous actor of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Hardly. He tends to concur with the director's criticism that Sorvino was acting by jealousy. Really?

He consistently acts as the grounded, serious thespian who maintains you must to get there on time, remember every crew member's name and get on with it. Absolutely. But he also recounts standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who'd made a young extra cry: “Say sorry to her! And learn some manners. Should you ever act that way in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! Hopkins sounds like an individual who stopped drinking but maybe not the belligerence that went with it. A Shakespearean like him must know Cornwall's lines on Kent from Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! A straightforward and sincere nature – he always tells the truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with an extensive addendum composed simply