🔗 Share this article

Many consider it the greatest entrance in film history – while he stands utterly motionless.

Clarice Starling, a rookie, navigates the line of detention units until she reaches the notorious doctor's reinforced glass enclosure. There he stands, appearing as a living skull filled with sinister intent, eerily immobile clad in a tight prisoner's blue outfit. He remains motionless until the moment he lunges toward the window, making that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. Numerous true-crime documentaries have since demonstrated that real-life murderers are often very boring, with nothing resembling Anthony Hopkins's powerful on-screen charisma.

He wasn't exactly unrecognized at the time he got the part that won him an Oscar in The Silence of the Lambs during the late 80s: it wasn't his debut, but a legend was forged. The character of Hannibal was inspired, Hopkins notes with amusement in his latest book, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Joseph Stalin as recalled by his daughter, as well as his strictly demanding drama teacher his instructor Fettes. Additionally, there existed a paternal-filial aspect to these scenes; a painful subject for Anthony, who further explains how his King Lear was indirectly affected by deep-seated remorse concerning Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his initial marriage in 1966 to his first wife, who resented his absences and his drinking habits.

The book's name comes from an historical picture of a young Hopkins with his father at the seaside – the boy who perhaps believed he couldn't make it. He felt confused, lonely, vulnerable little boy hailing from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the memorable figure here: a pastry chef and man's man, a straightforward talker who despised the religious hypocrites of the chapel and didn't believe in expressing his feelings, but also exhibited dreamy, sentimental tenderness. Richard Hopkins who furiously resented the necessity of going begging to their rich relatives like Auntie Patty, who was connected to 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're all hoping for some pickings! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The grovelling paid off, temporarily. Anthony struggled academically in his new institution. Then, during during an English class he had to recite the verse by John Masefield The West Wind – without seeing it first – and his talent emerged; he stunned the teacher and the other boys. He says quite plausibly that poems, alone, launched him. This, along with enrolling in the YMCA drama club. Surprisingly, he exited school without much hope, entered the acting world, and to the astonishment of his parents, was on stage alongside Laurence Olivier at the famous theater within 10 years. He largely achieved it alone, though at that time financial aid was available to go to Rada – a way up for performers from modest means. His father was always amazed with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: on asking his son to deliver the Yorick lines from Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then went into another room and wept openly.

Concerning the volatile, stubborn individual, he quit the National Theatre company in a moment of anger – much to Olivier's disappointment and displeasure – but stumbled upon a great TV role as a suspected war criminal in the series QB VII, which paved the way to characters including in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a successful acting career in cinema, which he preferred over theater. And he quit booze during the mid-70s having been a hell-raising alcoholic, and so survived into middle age to achieve remarkable acting, including Lecter, the butler Stevens in the film The Remains of the Day alongside Emma Thompson and the old man with dementia in the movie The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the later sections of the book his character seems more elusive, more deliberate. Some of the anecdotage aren't entirely successful. He remembers being taken out to lunch alongside his cast mate in Stone's Nixon, the much-respected actor Paul, who intended to inform him his performance as Nixon wasn't effective. 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 dismissal of Sorvino as driven out of envy. Truly?

He often portrays the grounded, serious thespian who believes you must to get there on time, know all the crew's names and do the job. Quite so. However, he also describes confronting an obnoxious director who brought a background actor to tears: “Say sorry to her! And acquire some decency. You ever do that again around me, I'll rearrange your face! Anthony comes across as a person who quit alcohol but possibly not the combativeness that came with it. A Shakespearean like him surely knows the lines about Kent from Cornwall from the play Lear: “He is incapable of flattery! A truthful and simple spirit – he must speak truth!”

He finishes his autobiography with an extensive addendum composed simply