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

The FBI trainee, just starting out, must walk the line of detention units arriving at Hannibal Lecter's transparent prison. He is positioned, appearing as a living skull filled with sinister intent, unnervingly still clad in a tight prisoner's blue outfit. He stands frozen until the moment he lunges toward the window, producing that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. Countless true-crime documentaries have since shown that actual serial killers are often very boring, far from Hopkins' commanding screen presence.

Hopkins was hardly unrecognized upon receiving his Academy Award-winning part in the 1991 thriller back in 1989: he was already established, but rather a megastar was forged. His Dr. Lecter was inspired, Hopkins notes with amusement in his recent memoir, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Stalin according to his daughter's memories, and on his own icily exacting drama teacher Christopher Fettes. Additionally, there existed a parent-child dynamic in these moments; a difficult topic for Hopkins, who also describes how his King Lear was subconsciously influenced by painful regret concerning Abigail, his distant daughter from his failed first union in 1966 to his first wife, who resented him being away and his alcohol use.

The title originates from a vintage war-era photograph of a young Hopkins on the beach with his dad – the boy who perhaps believed he couldn't make it. He was a bewildered, isolated and sensitive child raised in Port Talbot, the child of Richard Hopkins, the scene-stealing supporting player here: a bread-maker and a tough individual, a straightforward talker who loathed the Bible-punching hypocrites of the chapel and refused to displaying emotion, yet possessed a touch of wistful, tearful romanticism. Richard Hopkins who was angered by the way they had to go humbly to their rich relatives including Auntie Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with Nye Bevan and helped enroll the young Anthony into an elite school: “Because they're bloody rich!” he shouts in the car on the way there. “We are all expecting handouts! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The grovelling paid off, temporarily. Hopkins was a hopeless student at his new school. However, one day in a literature class he needed to deliver John Masefield's poem titled The West Wind – without seeing it first – and his talent emerged; he shocked the educator and the other boys. He reasonably claims that verse, by itself, started his career. This, along with enrolling in the YMCA drama club. Surprisingly, he exited school with low prospects, pursued acting, and amazingly to his parents, was performing alongside Laurence Olivier at the Old Vic within 10 years. He accomplished it mostly independently, though at that time scholarships existed to attend Rada – an opportunity for performers from modest means. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed by his son's international fame: when he asked Anthony to deliver the Yorick lines from the play Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then went into another room and began crying.

As for the hot-tempered, bloody-minded son, he left the National Theatre in a moment of anger – causing Olivier's regret and disapproval – but stumbled upon an excellent television part playing an alleged war criminal in the series QB VII, which led indirectly to roles such as in the film The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey in cinema, that he favored to the stage. And he quit booze back in 1975 after being a heavy drinker, and so survived into middle age to achieve remarkable acting, such as Lecter, the servant Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson featuring Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in The Father – his second Academy Award.

In the later sections of his autobiography he appears more reserved, more deliberate. A few tales doesn't quite come off. He remembers going out for lunch alongside his cast mate in the film Nixon, the highly regarded performer Sorvino, who wanted to tell him his performance as Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the moment for Anthony to gain insight a lesson from the famous actor of the Goodfellas fame? Not exactly. Hopkins seems to go along with Stone's dismissal that Sorvino was acting out of envy. Truly?

He repeatedly performs the tough, down-to-earth professional actor who maintains it is one's responsibility to get there on time, remember every crew member's name and do the job. Indeed. But he also recounts facing a rude director who'd made a young extra cry: “Say sorry to her! And acquire some decency. If you ever repeat that in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! Hopkins sounds like someone who gave up drink yet perhaps not the aggression that accompanied it. An actor of his caliber must know Cornwall's lines on Kent in King Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! A truthful and simple spirit – he must speak truth!”

He finishes his autobiography with a lengthy appendix composed simply