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Widely regarded as the most iconic introduction in film history – yet the actor stays utterly motionless.

A young FBI agent, new to the job, proceeds down the line of detention units until she reaches Hannibal Lecter's reinforced glass enclosure. There he stands, with features like a skeletal visage exuding demonic evil, unnervingly still in his form-fitting prisoner's blue outfit. He stands frozen before suddenly he lunges at the barrier, producing that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. A multitude of documentaries on serial killers have since demonstrated that actual serial killers are often very boring, lacking anything like Anthony Hopkins's powerful on-screen charisma.

Hopkins was hardly unrecognized at the time he got the part that won him an Oscar in the 1991 thriller in 1989: it wasn't his debut, but rather a megastar emerged. The character of Hannibal was based, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in his latest book, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Joseph Stalin according to his daughter's memories, and also from his rigorously precise drama teacher his mentor Fettes. There was also a paternal-filial aspect to these scenes; a painful subject for Hopkins, who further explains how his King Lear was indirectly affected by painful regret concerning Abigail, his distant daughter from his failed first union during the 60s to Petronella Barker, who was angered by his absences and drinking.

The memoir's title is derived from a vintage war-era photograph of Anthony as a small child with his father at the seaside – the child who might have felt he couldn't make it. He appeared lost, isolated and sensitive child raised in Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the scene-stealing supporting player in the narrative: a pastry chef and a tough individual, a plain speaker who despised the sanctimonious churchgoers of the chapel and avoided showing his emotions, but also exhibited wistful, tearful romanticism. His father who furiously resented the way they had to go humbly to their wealthy relations including Auntie Patty, whose husband knew the politician Nye Bevan and was able to secure Anthony as a boy into an elite school: “Since they are extremely wealthy!” he raves in the car on the way there. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Bloody rubbish, that's what it is!”

The grovelling paid off, for a time. He was a poor student at the prestigious school. However, one day during an English class he needed to deliver the verse by John Masefield The West Wind – without seeing it first – and that voice came to life; he shocked the educator and the other students. He convincingly states that poems, alone, propelled him forward. Combined with participating in the YMCA theater group. Notably, he graduated without much hope, pursued acting, and shocking his family, was on stage with the great Olivier at the Old Vic in just ten years. He largely achieved it alone, though at that time there were grants for drama school – a path to success for performers from modest means. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed by his son's international fame: on asking his son to perform the Yorick monologue from the play Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then retreated to another room and began crying.

Regarding the fiery, strong-willed son, he departed the theatrical troupe in a fit of pique – to Olivier's profound dismay and criticism – but fortunately found an excellent television part playing an alleged war criminal in the series QB VII, which paved the way to roles such as in Lynch's The Elephant Man and a thriving starry career in cinema, which he preferred over theater. And he quit booze back in 1975 once a notorious drinker, and thus made it through midlife to execute great performances, like Hannibal Lecter, the butler Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson alongside Emma Thompson and the old man with dementia in the movie The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the later sections of the book his character seems more elusive, more studied. Certain stories aren't entirely successful. He remembers having lunch with his fellow actor in the film Nixon, the highly regarded performer Sorvino, who sought to advise him his acting as Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the moment for Hopkins to learn a lesson from the famous actor of the Goodfellas fame? Hardly. He tends to concur with the director's criticism of Sorvino as driven due to resentment. Is that so?

He often portrays the no-nonsense, practical performer who believes it's your duty to be on time, learn everyone's name on set and do the job. Indeed. Yet he also tells standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who brought a background actor to tears: “Say sorry to her! And learn some manners. If you ever repeat that around me, I'll rearrange your face! Anthony comes across as an individual who stopped drinking but maybe not the belligerence that went with it. An actor of his caliber must know the lines about Kent from Cornwall in King Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! An honest mind and plain – he is compelled to be honest!”

Anthony ends his memoir with an extensive addendum composed simply