🔗 Share this article

It stands as the greatest introduction in film history – while he stands utterly motionless.

The FBI trainee, a rookie, must walk a row of prison cells until she reaches the notorious doctor's secure glass tank. The man is present, appearing as a skeletal visage radiating satanic malice, unnervingly still in his form-fitting prisoner's blue outfit. He doesn't move before suddenly he lunges toward the window, emitting that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. Countless real-crime films have since revealed that real-life murderers are often very boring, with nothing resembling the actor's commanding screen presence.

He wasn't exactly a newcomer when he landed that Oscar-winning role in the 1991 thriller in 1989: a star wasn't born, but a legend was cemented. His portrayal of Lecter drew influence, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in this new autobiography, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Joseph Stalin as recalled by his daughter, as well as his rigorously precise drama teacher his instructor Fettes. The scenes also contained a parent-child dynamic to these scenes; a painful subject for Hopkins, who further explains how his King Lear was unknowingly shaped by painful regret about Abigail, his distant daughter from his initial marriage during the 60s with Petronella Barker, who was angered by his absences and his drinking habits.

The book's name comes from an old wartime photo of a young Hopkins with his father at the seaside – the kid who maybe thought he couldn't make it. He appeared lost, isolated and sensitive child from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the memorable figure in the narrative: a baker and man's man, a direct communicator who detested the religious hypocrites at the church and refused to expressing his feelings, yet possessed a touch of nostalgic, emotional sentimentality. His father who was angered by how they were forced begging to their rich relatives including Auntie Patty, whose husband knew the famous Bevan and was able to secure the young Anthony into an elite school: “Due to their immense riches!” he shouts in the car on the way there. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Bloody rubbish, that's what it is!”

The humility worked, for a time. He was a poor student at his new school. However, one day in an English lesson he had to recite John Masefield's poem The West Wind – without seeing it first – and his voice awakened; he shocked the educator and the other students. He says quite plausibly that poems, alone, started his career. This, and joining the YMCA theater group. Notably, he graduated with low prospects, pursued acting, and to the astonishment of his parents, was on stage with Laurence Olivier at the famous theater in just ten years. He more or less did it on his own, although in those days there were grants to go to Rada – a way up for performers from modest means. His father was always amazed with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: when he asked Anthony to perform the Yorick monologue from Shakespeare's Hamlet, Richard listened carefully and then went into another room and burst into tears.

Concerning the volatile, bloody-minded son, he departed the theatrical troupe out of frustration – to Olivier's profound dismay and disapproval – but stumbled upon a memorable TV character playing an alleged war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which led indirectly to parts like that in the film The Elephant Man and a thriving starry career in movies, which he preferred to the stage. And he quit booze back in 1975 after being a heavy drinker, and so survived through midlife to deliver outstanding roles, including Lecter, the steward Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson with Emma Thompson and the old man with dementia in the movie The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the latter half of his autobiography his personality becomes more opaque, more calculated. Some of the anecdotage aren't entirely successful. He remembers going out for lunch by his co-star in the film Nixon, the much-respected actor Sorvino, who intended to inform him his performance as Nixon wasn't working. Was this the opportunity for Anthony to gain insight something from the legendary star from Goodfellas? Not exactly. Anthony appears to agree with Stone's rejection of Sorvino as driven by jealousy. Is that so?

He repeatedly performs the tough, down-to-earth professional actor who maintains it is one's responsibility to arrive punctually, know all the crew's names and do the job. Absolutely. Yet he also tells facing a rude director who caused a young extra to weep: “Say sorry to her! And acquire some decency. Should you ever act that way around me, I'll rearrange your face! Hopkins sounds like an individual who stopped drinking yet perhaps not the aggression that went with it. An actor of his caliber is aware of the lines about Kent from Cornwall in King Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! A straightforward and sincere nature – he must speak truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with a detailed supplement composed simply