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Widely regarded as the most memorable introduction in film history – and he remains utterly motionless.

Clarice Starling, new to the job, navigates a corridor of cells until she reaches Hannibal Lecter's secure glass tank. The man is present, appearing as a living skull radiating satanic malice, chillingly static in his form-fitting prisoner's blue outfit. He doesn't move until the moment he throws himself at the barrier, producing that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. Numerous documentaries on serial killers have since demonstrated that actual serial killers are usually uninteresting, lacking anything like Anthony Hopkins's powerful on-screen charisma.

Hopkins was hardly a newcomer upon receiving his Academy Award-winning part in the iconic film in 1989: he was already established, but rather a megastar emerged. His Dr. Lecter was based, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in his latest book, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Joseph Stalin according to his daughter's memories, and on his own icily exacting Rada tutor his mentor Fettes. There was also a paternal-filial aspect in these moments; a painful subject for the actor, who also describes how his King Lear was unknowingly shaped by deep-seated remorse about Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his disastrous first marriage during the 60s to his first wife, who disliked his absences and drinking.

The book's name comes from a vintage war-era photograph of Hopkins as a toddler on the beach with his dad – the boy who perhaps believed he couldn't make it. He appeared lost, shy and fragile youth from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the standout secondary character in the narrative: a pastry chef and a traditional male, a plain speaker who detested the religious hypocrites of the chapel and didn't believe in displaying emotion, but had a streak of dreamy, sentimental tenderness. His father who was angered by how they were forced humbly to their wealthy relations including Auntie Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with Nye Bevan and helped enroll 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! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The grovelling paid off, temporarily. Anthony struggled academically at his new school. But one day during an English class he was required to perform the poem by Masefield titled The West Wind – without prior preparation – and his voice awakened; he shocked the educator and the other students. He reasonably claims that poems, alone, launched him. This, along with enrolling in the YMCA theater group. Remarkably, he left school with low prospects, went into acting, and amazingly to his parents, was acting alongside Laurence Olivier at the renowned Old Vic in just ten years. He accomplished it mostly independently, even though back then there were grants to go to Rada – a path to success for performers from modest means. His father was always amazed by his son's international fame: upon requesting his son to recite the Yorick speech from the play Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then left the room and began crying.

As for the hot-tempered, bloody-minded son, he left the National Theatre out of frustration – causing Olivier's regret and disapproval – but lucked into a memorable TV character as a suspected war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which eventually resulted 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 back in 1975 after being a heavy drinker, and so survived through midlife to deliver outstanding roles, including Lecter, the steward Stevens in the film The Remains of the Day with Emma Thompson and the senior with memory loss in the movie The Father – his second Academy Award.

In the later sections of the memoir he appears more reserved, more studied. Some of the anecdotage aren't entirely successful. He recalls having lunch by his co-star in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the highly regarded performer Paul Sorvino, who wanted to tell him his performance as Nixon was falling short. Was this the opportunity for Hopkins to learn a lesson from the famous actor from Goodfellas? Hardly. Hopkins seems to go along with Stone's dismissal of Sorvino as driven out of envy. Really?

He repeatedly performs the grounded, serious thespian who believes you must to get there on time, remember every crew member's name and get on with it. Quite so. Yet he also tells confronting an obnoxious director who brought a background actor to tears: “Apologize to that girl! And develop some respect. You ever do that again around me, I'll rearrange your face! Hopkins sounds like someone who gave up drink but maybe not the belligerence that came with it. An actor of his caliber must know Cornwall's speech regarding Kent from the play Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! A truthful and simple spirit – he is compelled to be honest!”

Anthony ends his memoir with an extensive addendum composed simply