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Many consider it the most memorable appearance in cinematic history – while he stands completely still.

A young FBI agent, new to the job, navigates a row of prison cells arriving at the notorious doctor's reinforced glass enclosure. He is positioned, with features like a living skull exuding demonic evil, unnervingly still in his form-fitting blue prison jumpsuit. He doesn't move until the moment he propels himself toward the window, producing that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. Numerous documentaries on serial killers have since demonstrated that actual serial killers are usually uninteresting, with nothing resembling the actor's powerful on-screen charisma.

Hopkins was hardly unrecognized when he landed that Oscar-winning role in the iconic film in 1989: he was already established, but a legend was forged. His portrayal of Lecter was inspired, the actor happily remembers in his recent memoir, on the classic Dracula, on the Soviet leader according to his daughter's memories, and on his own icily exacting drama teacher his instructor Fettes. There was also a paternal-filial aspect in these moments; a sore point for Anthony, who further explains how his King Lear was indirectly affected by deep-seated remorse regarding his daughter Abigail, the estranged daughter from his failed first union in 1966 to his first wife, who resented his time away and his drinking habits.

The memoir's title is derived from an old wartime photo 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, isolated and sensitive child raised in Port Talbot, son of Richard Arthur Hopkins, the memorable figure in this story: a baker and a traditional male, a direct communicator who despised the sanctimonious churchgoers at the church and avoided expressing his feelings, but also exhibited dreamy, sentimental tenderness. It was Hopkins Sr who was angered by how they were forced cap-in-hand to their wealthy relations including Auntie Patty, who was connected to Nye Bevan and helped enroll young Anthony into a posh school: “Due to their immense riches!” he raves in the car on the way there. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The humility worked, for a time. Hopkins was a hopeless student at the prestigious school. Then, during during an English class he was required to perform the verse by John Masefield known as The West Wind – without seeing it first – and his voice awakened; he stunned the teacher and the other students. He convincingly states that poetry, on its own, propelled him forward. This, along with enrolling in the YMCA drama club. Remarkably, he left school a no-hoper, went into acting, and shocking his family, was acting with Laurence Olivier at the famous theater within 10 years. He accomplished it mostly independently, even though back then scholarships existed for drama school – a path to success for performers from modest means. His father was always amazed by his son's international fame: when he asked Anthony to recite the Yorick speech from Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then retreated to another room and began crying.

Concerning the volatile, bloody-minded son, he quit the National Theatre company in a fit of pique – causing Olivier's regret and displeasure – but fortunately found a memorable TV character as a potential war criminal in the series QB VII, which paved the way to parts like that in the film The Elephant Man and a thriving starry career in cinema, which he liked more over theater. He stopped drinking back in 1975 once a notorious drinker, and thus made it into his later years to execute great performances, like Hannibal Lecter, the butler Stevens in the film The Remains of the Day alongside Emma Thompson and the senior with memory loss in his film The Father – his second Oscar.

During the second part of his autobiography he appears more reserved, more calculated. Certain stories doesn't quite come off. He mentions being taken out to lunch by his co-star in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the much-respected actor Paul, who wanted to tell him his portrayal of Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the opportunity for him to absorb a lesson from the famous actor of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Hardly. Anthony appears to agree with Stone's dismissal of Sorvino as being motivated due to resentment. Really?

He repeatedly performs the no-nonsense, practical performer who believes it is one's responsibility to be on time, remember every crew member's name and proceed with the work. Indeed. However, he also describes confronting an obnoxious director who caused a young extra to weep: “Apologize to that girl! And develop some respect. You ever do that again in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! Hopkins sounds like an individual who stopped drinking but maybe not the belligerence that came with it. An actor of his caliber surely knows the lines about Kent from Cornwall from Lear: “He is incapable of flattery! A straightforward and sincere nature – he must speak truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with a detailed supplement composed simply