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Many consider it the greatest entrance in movie lore – yet the actor stays without moving a muscle.

The FBI trainee, new to the job, must walk a row of prison cells until she reaches the notorious doctor's transparent prison. The man is present, with features like a living skull filled with sinister intent, unnervingly still wearing a snug prisoner's blue outfit. He remains motionless until the moment he throws himself toward the window, producing that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. Countless real-crime films have since revealed that real-life murderers are usually uninteresting, lacking anything like Hopkins' powerful on-screen charisma.

He was not unrecognized when he landed his Academy Award-winning part in The Silence of the Lambs during the late 80s: a star wasn't born, but rather a megastar was forged. His Dr. Lecter drew influence, Hopkins notes with amusement in his recent memoir, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Stalin as recalled by his daughter, and on his own strictly demanding drama teacher his instructor Fettes. There was also a parent-child dynamic to these scenes; a painful subject for Anthony, who further explains how his portrayal of Lear was subconsciously influenced by deep-seated remorse about Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his failed first union back in 1966 to his first wife, who disliked his time away and his drinking habits.

The book's name comes from an old wartime photo of a young Hopkins playing on the sand with his father – the kid who maybe thought he couldn't make it. He felt confused, shy and fragile youth from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the standout secondary character in this story: a pastry chef and man's man, a direct communicator who loathed the Bible-punching hypocrites of the chapel and avoided showing his emotions, yet possessed a touch of dreamy, sentimental tenderness. Richard Hopkins who was angered by the necessity of going humbly to their wealthy relations including Auntie Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with the famous Bevan and was able to secure Anthony as a boy into a prestigious academy: “Due to their immense riches!” he exclaims during the car ride. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The grovelling paid off, for a time. Anthony struggled academically at his new school. However, one day in an English lesson he needed to deliver the poem by Masefield known as The West Wind – sight unseen – and his voice awakened; he stunned the teacher and the other boys. He says quite plausibly that verse, by itself, launched him. Combined with participating in the dramatic society at the YMCA. Notably, he graduated with low prospects, pursued acting, and shocking his family, was acting with Laurence Olivier at the renowned Old Vic in just ten years. He more or less did it on his own, though at that time financial aid was available for drama school – a path to success for actors from humble backgrounds. His father was always amazed by his son's international fame: on asking his son to recite the Yorick speech from Shakespeare's Hamlet, Richard listened carefully and then went into another room and burst into tears.

Regarding the fiery, bloody-minded son, he departed the theatrical troupe in a fit of pique – much to Olivier's disappointment and criticism – but lucked into an excellent television part as a potential war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which paved the way to characters including in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a successful acting career in cinema, which he preferred to the stage. And he quit booze in 1975 once a notorious drinker, and managed to live into his later years to execute great performances, like Hannibal Lecter, the servant Stevens in The Remains of the Day alongside Emma Thompson and the senior with memory loss in the movie The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the latter half of the book his character seems more elusive, more studied. Some of the anecdotage fall a bit flat. He remembers being taken out to lunch with his fellow actor in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Paul, who intended to inform him his performance as Nixon wasn't working. Was this the chance for Hopkins to learn something from the legendary star of the Goodfellas fame? Hardly. He tends to concur with the director's criticism of Sorvino as driven out of envy. Really?

He repeatedly performs the grounded, serious thespian who thinks you must to arrive punctually, learn everyone's name on set and proceed with the work. Absolutely. Yet he also tells standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who caused a young extra to weep: “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! Anthony comes across as an individual who stopped drinking yet perhaps not the aggression that accompanied it. An actor of his caliber must know Cornwall's speech regarding Kent from the play Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! An honest mind and plain – he must speak truth!”

He finishes his autobiography with an extensive addendum composed simply