🔗 Share this article

Widely regarded as the most memorable introduction in film history – yet the actor stays without moving a muscle.

Clarice Starling, new to the job, must walk the line of detention units until she reaches the notorious doctor's secure glass tank. The man is present, his face resembling a living skull filled with sinister intent, chillingly static clad in a tight prisoner's blue outfit. He doesn't move until the moment he lunges against the glass, producing that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. A multitude of documentaries on serial killers have since shown that genuine criminals are often very boring, far from Hopkins' commanding screen presence.

He wasn't exactly a newcomer at the time he got the part that won him an Oscar in the 1991 thriller during the late 80s: a star wasn't born, instead, a superstar was forged. His Dr. Lecter was inspired, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in this new autobiography, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Stalin based on his daughter's accounts, and also from his rigorously precise acting coach Christopher Fettes. The scenes also contained a parent-child dynamic within the narrative; a painful subject for the actor, who also describes how his portrayal of Lear was indirectly affected by painful regret concerning Abigail, his distant daughter from his failed first union back in 1966 with Petronella Barker, who disliked his absences and his drinking habits.

The memoir's title is derived from a vintage war-era photograph of a young Hopkins playing on the sand with his father – the kid who maybe thought he couldn't make it. He was a bewildered, lonely, vulnerable little boy hailing from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the memorable figure in the narrative: a pastry chef and a tough individual, a straightforward talker who despised the religious hypocrites in their community and avoided showing his emotions, but had a streak of wistful, tearful romanticism. It was Hopkins Sr who furiously resented how they were forced begging to their wealthy relations such as Aunt Patty, whose husband knew Nye Bevan and helped enroll Anthony as a boy into an elite school: “Due to their immense riches!” he exclaims in the car on the way there. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Bloody rubbish, that's what it is!”

The humility worked, for a time. Anthony struggled academically in his new institution. But one day in an English lesson he needed to deliver the verse by John Masefield titled The West Wind – sight unseen – and his voice awakened; he shocked the educator and his classmates. He says quite plausibly that verse, by itself, propelled him forward. This, and joining the YMCA theater group. Surprisingly, he exited school without much hope, entered the acting world, and shocking his family, was acting alongside Laurence Olivier at the famous theater within 10 years. He more or less did it on his own, even though back then financial aid was available to attend Rada – a path to success for working-class actors. His dad remained in awe by his son's international fame: when he asked Anthony to perform the Yorick monologue from Shakespeare's Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then left the room and burst into tears.

Regarding the fiery, stubborn individual, he quit the National Theatre company in a fit of pique – much to Olivier's disappointment and criticism – but lucked into an excellent television part as a potential war criminal in the series QB VII, which paved the way to parts like that in Lynch's The Elephant Man and a thriving starry career in cinema, that he favored to the stage. He gave up alcohol back in 1975 once a notorious drinker, and thus made it through midlife to achieve remarkable acting, such as Lecter, the steward Stevens in The Remains of the Day featuring Emma Thompson and the old man with dementia in the movie The Father – his next Oscar win.

During the second part of his autobiography he appears more reserved, more calculated. Certain stories aren't entirely successful. He remembers having lunch alongside his cast mate in the film Nixon, the much-respected actor Sorvino, who wanted to tell him his acting as Nixon wasn't working. Was this the opportunity for Anthony to gain insight something from the legendary star of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Not exactly. Anthony appears to agree with the director's criticism that Sorvino was acting due to resentment. Is that so?

He repeatedly performs the grounded, serious thespian who believes it's your duty to get there on time, learn everyone's name on set and proceed with the work. Quite so. But he also recounts confronting an obnoxious director who brought a background actor to tears: “Apologize to that girl! And learn some manners. If you ever repeat that near me, I'll alter your appearance!” He appears to be an individual who stopped drinking yet perhaps not the aggression that went with it. A Shakespearean like him must know Cornwall's lines on Kent in King Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! A truthful and simple spirit – he must speak truth!”

Hopkins concludes his book with a detailed supplement composed simply