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It stands as the most iconic entrance in film history – and he remains utterly motionless.

A young FBI agent, just starting out, must walk a row of prison cells until she reaches the notorious doctor's secure glass tank. There he stands, with features like a skeletal visage radiating satanic malice, unnervingly still in his form-fitting prisoner's blue outfit. He stands frozen right up until he propels himself at the barrier, making that unforgettable spitting-growling noise. Countless real-crime films have since revealed that genuine criminals are often very boring, lacking anything like the actor's commanding screen presence.

He wasn't exactly unrecognized when he landed his Academy Award-winning part in the iconic film back in 1989: a star wasn't born, but rather a megastar emerged. The character of Hannibal was inspired, Hopkins notes with amusement in his recent memoir, on the classic Dracula, on Joseph Stalin as recalled by his daughter, and on his own icily exacting drama teacher Christopher Fettes. There was also a paternal-filial aspect within the narrative; a painful subject for Anthony, who further explains how his King Lear was unknowingly shaped by an agonised guilt about Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his disastrous first marriage during the 60s with Petronella Barker, who disliked his absences and his drinking habits.

The book's name comes from an historical picture of Hopkins as a toddler on the beach with his dad – the kid who maybe thought he couldn't make it. He was a bewildered, shy and fragile youth hailing from Port Talbot, son of Richard Arthur Hopkins, the memorable figure in this story: a baker and a tough individual, a straightforward talker who despised the Bible-punching hypocrites of the chapel and didn't believe in displaying emotion, but had a streak of nostalgic, emotional sentimentality. It was Hopkins Sr who was angered by the way they had to go humbly to their wealthy relations including Auntie Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with the politician Nye Bevan and was able to secure the young Anthony into a prestigious academy: “Due to their immense riches!” he exclaims during the car ride. “We are all expecting handouts! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The humility worked, for a time. Hopkins was a hopeless student at his new school. However, one day in an English lesson he needed to deliver the verse by John Masefield known as The West Wind – without prior preparation – and his voice awakened; he shocked the educator and his classmates. He says quite plausibly that poems, alone, started his career. Combined with participating in the dramatic society at the YMCA. Notably, he graduated with low prospects, went into acting, and shocking his family, was on stage with Laurence Olivier at the Old Vic within 10 years. He more or less did it on his own, even though back then there were grants for drama school – a path to success for performers from modest means. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: when he asked Anthony to recite the Yorick speech from the play Hamlet, Richard listened carefully and then retreated to another room and wept openly.

Regarding the fiery, stubborn individual, he quit the National Theatre company in a fit of pique – much to Olivier's disappointment and displeasure – but stumbled upon an excellent television part as a suspected war criminal in the series QB VII, which eventually resulted to characters including in the film The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey on screen, that he favored to the stage. And he quit booze during the mid-70s having been a hell-raising alcoholic, and so survived into middle age to achieve remarkable acting, such as Lecter, the steward Stevens in the film 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 memoir his personality becomes more opaque, more deliberate. A few tales fall a bit flat. He mentions having lunch by his co-star in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Sorvino, who wanted to tell him his acting as Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the opportunity for Hopkins to learn advice from the renowned performer from Goodfellas? Not exactly. Hopkins seems to go along with Stone's dismissal of Sorvino as being motivated due to resentment. Is that so?

He often portrays the no-nonsense, practical performer who believes it is one's responsibility to get there on time, know all the crew's names and do the job. Indeed. Yet he also tells confronting an obnoxious director who brought a background actor to tears: “Apologise to her! And acquire some decency. You ever do that again near me, I'll alter your appearance!” He appears to be an individual who stopped drinking yet perhaps not the aggression that came with it. A classical performer like Hopkins must know the lines about Kent from Cornwall in King Lear: “He is incapable of flattery! An honest mind and plain – he is compelled to be honest!”

He finishes his autobiography with an extensive addendum composed simply