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Widely regarded as the most memorable introduction in film history – while he stands without moving a muscle.

The FBI trainee, a rookie, proceeds down a row of prison cells arriving at the notorious doctor's reinforced glass enclosure. The man is present, appearing as a skeletal visage exuding demonic evil, eerily immobile in his form-fitting blue inmate uniform. He doesn't move before suddenly he propels himself at the barrier, making that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. Countless true-crime documentaries have since demonstrated that genuine criminals tend to be quite dull, with nothing resembling the actor's powerful on-screen charisma.

Hopkins was hardly a newcomer upon receiving 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 recent memoir, from Lugosi's Dracula, on Stalin according to his daughter's memories, and on his own icily exacting acting coach his mentor Fettes. There was also a parent-child dynamic in these moments; a sore point for the actor, who further explains how his King Lear was indirectly affected by painful regret about Abigail, his distant daughter from his disastrous first marriage during the 60s to his first wife, who was angered by his time away and drinking.

The title originates from a vintage war-era photograph of Anthony as a small child with his father at the seaside – the boy who perhaps believed he wouldn't succeed. He felt confused, shy and fragile youth raised in Port Talbot, the child of Richard Hopkins, the standout secondary character in the narrative: a bread-maker and a tough individual, a plain speaker who detested the sanctimonious churchgoers of the chapel and avoided displaying emotion, but also exhibited dreamy, sentimental tenderness. Richard Hopkins who furiously resented the way they had to go humbly to affluent family members including Auntie Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with the politician Nye Bevan and helped enroll Anthony as a boy into an elite school: “Since they are extremely wealthy!” he raves while traveling there. “We are all expecting handouts! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The grovelling paid off, temporarily. He was a poor student in his new institution. But one day in an English lesson he was required to perform John Masefield's poem The West Wind – without prior preparation – and his talent emerged; he shocked the educator and the other students. He reasonably claims that poetry, on its own, started his career. Combined with participating in the dramatic society at the YMCA. Remarkably, he left school a no-hoper, pursued acting, and shocking his family, was acting with Laurence Olivier at the famous theater in under a decade. He more or less did it on his own, although in those days there were grants for drama school – an opportunity 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, Richard listened carefully and then retreated to another room and wept openly.

As for the hot-tempered, strong-willed son, he left the National Theatre in a moment of anger – much to Olivier's disappointment and criticism – but lucked into a memorable TV character playing an alleged war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which eventually resulted to roles such as in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a successful acting career in cinema, that he favored over theater. He gave up alcohol back in 1975 having been a hell-raising alcoholic, and thus made it into his later years to execute great performances, like Hannibal Lecter, the servant Stevens in the film The Remains of the Day alongside Emma Thompson and the old man with dementia in the movie The Father – his second Academy Award.

During the second part of his autobiography his personality becomes more opaque, more calculated. Some of the anecdotage doesn't quite come off. He recalls having lunch by his co-star in Stone's Nixon, the much-respected actor Sorvino, who intended to inform him his portrayal of Nixon was falling short. Was this the chance for him to absorb a lesson from the famous actor from Goodfellas? Hardly. He tends to concur with Stone's dismissal of Sorvino as driven due to resentment. Really?

He often portrays the grounded, serious thespian who maintains you must to be on time, know all the crew's names and do the job. Absolutely. Yet he also tells standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who caused a young extra to weep: “Apologize to that girl! And learn some manners. If you ever repeat that around me, I'll rearrange your face! He appears to be a person who quit alcohol but maybe not the belligerence that accompanied it. An actor of his caliber surely knows Cornwall's lines on Kent 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