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It stands as the most memorable appearance in movie lore – yet the actor stays without moving a muscle.

The FBI trainee, new to the job, navigates the line of detention units arriving at the notorious doctor's reinforced glass enclosure. There he stands, his face resembling a living skull exuding demonic evil, eerily immobile in his form-fitting prisoner's blue outfit. He stands frozen until the moment he propels himself against the glass, emitting that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. A multitude of true-crime documentaries have since revealed that real-life murderers are usually uninteresting, lacking anything like Hopkins' captivating film persona.

Hopkins was hardly an unknown upon receiving the part that won him an Oscar in the iconic film during the late 80s: he was already established, but a legend was forged. The character of Hannibal was based, Hopkins notes with amusement in this new autobiography, from Lugosi's Dracula, on Joseph Stalin based on his daughter's accounts, as well as his icily exacting drama teacher his instructor Fettes. The scenes also contained a father-daughter dimension in these moments; a sore point for the actor, who further explains how his portrayal of Lear was subconsciously influenced by an agonised guilt about Abigail, the estranged daughter from his failed first union during the 60s to Petronella Barker, who was angered by his absences and drinking.

The title originates from a vintage war-era photograph of Hopkins as a toddler with his father at the seaside – the boy who perhaps believed he wouldn't succeed. He felt confused, lonely, vulnerable little boy hailing from Port Talbot, the child of Richard Hopkins, the memorable figure in the narrative: a pastry chef and man's man, a plain speaker who loathed the sanctimonious churchgoers of the chapel and avoided displaying emotion, but also exhibited dreamy, sentimental tenderness. Richard Hopkins who was angered by the necessity of going begging to affluent family members including Auntie Patty, whose husband knew Nye Bevan and was able to secure young Anthony into a prestigious academy: “Because they're bloody rich!” he exclaims in the car on the way there. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The humility worked, temporarily. He was a poor student in his new institution. But one day in a literature class he had to recite the poem by Masefield titled The West Wind – without prior preparation – and his voice awakened; he stunned the teacher and the other boys. He reasonably claims that verse, by itself, launched him. This, and joining the dramatic society at the YMCA. Remarkably, he left school with low prospects, went into acting, and shocking his family, was acting with the great Olivier at the famous theater in under a decade. He largely achieved it alone, even though back then there were grants to attend Rada – an opportunity for working-class actors. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed by his son's international fame: upon requesting his son to deliver the Yorick lines from the play Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then left the room and began crying.

Concerning the volatile, strong-willed son, he quit the National Theatre company in a moment of anger – causing Olivier's regret and displeasure – but stumbled upon a memorable TV character 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 luminous film journey on screen, that he favored over theater. And he quit booze in 1975 once a notorious drinker, and thus made it through midlife to deliver outstanding roles, such as Lecter, the servant Stevens in the film The Remains of the Day with Emma Thompson and the senior with memory loss in The Father – his next Oscar win.

During the second part of the memoir his personality becomes more opaque, more calculated. Certain stories aren't entirely successful. He recalls having lunch alongside his cast mate in Stone's Nixon, the much-respected actor Paul, who sought to advise him his portrayal of Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the chance for Hopkins to learn something from the legendary star from Goodfellas? Not really. He tends to concur with Stone's rejection of Sorvino as driven out of envy. Is that so?

He repeatedly performs the tough, down-to-earth professional actor who thinks you must to be on time, remember every crew member's name and do the job. Absolutely. Yet he also tells facing a rude director who caused a young extra to weep: “Apologise to her! And learn some manners. You ever do that again near me, I'll alter your appearance!” He appears to be a person who quit alcohol yet perhaps not the aggression that went with it. A Shakespearean like him surely knows the lines about Kent from Cornwall from the play Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! An honest mind and plain – he always tells the truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with a detailed supplement composed simply