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It stands as the most iconic appearance in movie lore – while he stands completely still.

The FBI trainee, new to the job, navigates a corridor of cells arriving at Dr. Lecter's transparent prison. The man is present, with features like a skeletal visage radiating satanic malice, chillingly static wearing a snug blue inmate uniform. He remains motionless until the moment he throws himself toward the window, emitting that unforgettable spitting-growling noise. Countless true-crime documentaries have since demonstrated that real-life murderers are often very boring, lacking anything like Anthony Hopkins's commanding screen presence.

He was not unrecognized at the time he got that Oscar-winning role in the 1991 thriller in 1989: it wasn't his debut, instead, a superstar was cemented. The character of Hannibal was inspired, Hopkins notes with amusement in his latest book, on the classic Dracula, on the Soviet leader as recalled by his daughter, as well as his rigorously precise Rada tutor his instructor Fettes. There was also a parent-child dynamic to these scenes; a painful subject for Anthony, who also describes how his portrayal of Lear was indirectly affected by deep-seated remorse regarding his daughter Abigail, his distant daughter from his disastrous first marriage back in 1966 to his first wife, who resented his absences and his drinking habits.

The memoir's title is derived from an historical picture of Hopkins as a toddler with his father at the seaside – the child who might have felt he couldn't make it. He felt confused, isolated and sensitive child from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the standout secondary character in the narrative: a pastry chef and a tough individual, a direct communicator who despised the sanctimonious churchgoers in their community and didn't believe in displaying emotion, but also exhibited nostalgic, emotional sentimentality. His father who deeply disliked the way they had to go begging to their rich relatives like Auntie Patty, whose husband knew Nye Bevan and could get Anthony as a boy into an elite school: “Due to their immense riches!” he shouts in the car on the way there. “We are all expecting handouts! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The grovelling paid off, temporarily. Hopkins was a hopeless student at his new school. However, one day in an English lesson he had to recite John Masefield's poem The West Wind – without seeing it first – and his voice awakened; he amazed the instructor and the other students. He says quite plausibly that verse, by itself, started his career. This, and joining the dramatic society at the YMCA. Notably, he graduated a no-hoper, pursued acting, and shocking his family, was on stage with Laurence Olivier at the renowned Old Vic within 10 years. He more or less did it on his own, although in those days there were grants for drama school – a path to success for actors from humble backgrounds. His father was always amazed by his son's international fame: on asking his son to deliver the Yorick lines from Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then left the room and burst into tears.

Regarding the fiery, bloody-minded son, he left the National Theatre in a moment of anger – to Olivier's profound dismay and disapproval – but stumbled upon a memorable TV character playing an alleged war criminal in the series QB VII, which eventually resulted to parts like that in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey in movies, which he preferred to the stage. He stopped drinking during the mid-70s once a notorious drinker, and managed to live through midlife to execute great performances, including Lecter, the butler Stevens in The Remains of the Day alongside Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in The Father – his next Oscar win.

During the second part of his autobiography his personality becomes more opaque, more calculated. Some of the anecdotage fall a bit flat. He mentions having lunch alongside his cast mate in the film Nixon, the much-respected actor Paul, who sought to advise him his acting as Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the opportunity for Anthony to gain insight something from the legendary star of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Hardly. Hopkins seems to go along with Stone's rejection of Sorvino as being motivated by jealousy. Really?

He often portrays the grounded, serious thespian who thinks it is one's responsibility to be on time, know all the crew's names and get on with it. Quite so. However, he also describes standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who'd made a young extra cry: “Say sorry to her! And acquire some decency. You ever do that again around me, I'll rearrange your face! Hopkins sounds like someone who gave up drink yet perhaps not the aggression that accompanied it. A classical performer like Hopkins is aware of the lines about Kent from Cornwall in King Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! An honest mind and plain – he must speak truth!”

Hopkins concludes his book with a lengthy appendix composed simply