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Widely regarded as the most iconic appearance in movie lore – yet the actor stays completely still.

Clarice Starling, a rookie, navigates a corridor of cells until she reaches Dr. Lecter's reinforced glass enclosure. He is positioned, his face resembling a skeletal visage radiating satanic malice, chillingly static clad in a tight blue inmate uniform. He remains motionless until the moment he propels himself toward the window, emitting that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. A multitude of real-crime films have since shown that actual serial killers tend to be quite dull, lacking anything like Anthony Hopkins's powerful on-screen charisma.

He was not a newcomer when he landed that Oscar-winning role in The Silence of the Lambs during the late 80s: a star wasn't born, but rather a megastar was forged. His Dr. Lecter was based, Hopkins notes with amusement in his latest book, from Lugosi's Dracula, on Stalin based on his daughter's accounts, and also from his strictly demanding drama teacher his instructor Fettes. The scenes also contained a parent-child dynamic to these scenes; a difficult topic for Anthony, who recounts how his Lear was unknowingly shaped by painful regret concerning Abigail, the estranged daughter from his disastrous first marriage in 1966 to Petronella Barker, who disliked his time away and drinking.

The book's name comes from an historical picture of Hopkins as a toddler with his father at the seaside – the boy who perhaps believed he wouldn't succeed. He appeared lost, shy and fragile youth from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the scene-stealing supporting player here: a bread-maker and a tough individual, a plain speaker who despised the sanctimonious churchgoers at the church and refused to expressing his feelings, but had a streak of wistful, tearful romanticism. Richard Hopkins who deeply disliked the necessity of going begging to their rich relatives including Auntie Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with the politician Nye Bevan and could get the young Anthony into a posh school: “Because they're bloody rich!” he shouts during the car ride. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The grovelling paid off, temporarily. Hopkins was a hopeless student in his new institution. Then, during in an English lesson he needed to deliver the poem by Masefield titled The West Wind – without prior preparation – and his voice awakened; he amazed the instructor and the other students. He convincingly states that verse, by itself, launched him. This, along with enrolling in the YMCA drama club. Remarkably, he left school without much hope, entered the acting world, and shocking his family, was performing with the great Olivier at the famous theater within 10 years. He largely achieved it alone, though at that time there were grants for drama school – a path to success for working-class actors. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed by his son's international fame: on asking his son to perform the Yorick monologue from Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then went into another room and began crying.

Regarding the fiery, bloody-minded son, he departed the theatrical troupe in a moment of anger – to Olivier's profound dismay and displeasure – but stumbled upon an excellent television part as a suspected war criminal in Leon Uris's QB VII, which eventually resulted to parts like that in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a thriving starry career in cinema, which he liked more compared to stage acting. And he quit booze in 1975 after being a heavy drinker, and thus made it into his later years to deliver outstanding roles, such as Lecter, the servant Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson featuring Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in his film The Father – his second Academy Award.

In the latter half of his autobiography his personality becomes more opaque, more deliberate. Some of the anecdotage fall a bit flat. He remembers being taken out to lunch alongside his cast mate in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the highly regarded performer Paul, who intended to inform him his acting as Nixon wasn't working. Was this the opportunity for Anthony to gain insight a lesson from the famous actor of the Goodfellas fame? Hardly. He tends to concur with Stone's dismissal of Sorvino as driven out of envy. Really?

He often portrays the grounded, serious thespian who believes you must to get there on time, remember every crew member's name and proceed with the work. Absolutely. However, he also describes standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who'd made a young extra cry: “Apologize to that girl! And learn some manners. If you ever repeat that in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! He appears to be an individual who stopped drinking but possibly not the combativeness that went with it. A classical performer like Hopkins must know Cornwall's speech regarding Kent from the play Lear: “He is incapable of flattery! An honest mind and plain – he must speak truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with an extensive addendum composed simply