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Many consider it the most iconic entrance in film history – while he stands without moving a muscle.

A young FBI agent, new to the job, proceeds down the line of detention units arriving at Hannibal Lecter's transparent prison. The man is present, with features like a skeletal visage radiating satanic malice, unnervingly still clad in a tight blue prison jumpsuit. He doesn't move before suddenly he lunges toward the window, producing that unforgettable spitting-growling noise. Numerous real-crime films have since demonstrated that genuine criminals are usually uninteresting, with nothing resembling Anthony Hopkins's powerful on-screen charisma.

Hopkins was hardly an unknown at the time he got that Oscar-winning role in The Silence of the Lambs back in 1989: a star wasn't born, but rather a megastar was forged. His portrayal of Lecter was based, the actor happily remembers in his recent memoir, from Lugosi's Dracula, on Stalin according to his daughter's memories, and also from his strictly demanding acting coach his instructor Fettes. The scenes also contained a paternal-filial aspect to these scenes; a sore point for Hopkins, who further explains how his Lear was indirectly affected by deep-seated remorse about Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his disastrous first marriage during the 60s with Petronella Barker, who was angered by his time away and his drinking habits.

The title originates from a vintage war-era photograph of a young Hopkins with his father at the seaside – the boy who perhaps believed he would never do OK. He was a bewildered, lonely, vulnerable little boy hailing from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the scene-stealing supporting player here: a pastry chef and a traditional male, a direct communicator who detested the Bible-punching hypocrites of the chapel and didn't believe in showing his emotions, but had a streak of wistful, tearful romanticism. His father who deeply disliked how they were forced begging to their wealthy relations including Auntie Patty, whose husband knew Nye Bevan and helped enroll the young Anthony into an elite school: “Due to their immense riches!” he shouts while traveling there. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Bloody rubbish, that's what it is!”

The pleading was effective, for a while. Hopkins was a hopeless student at the prestigious school. However, one day during an English class he was required to perform John Masefield's poem known as The West Wind – without seeing it first – and his voice awakened; he stunned the teacher and the other boys. He says quite plausibly that poetry, on its own, launched him. Combined with participating in the YMCA drama club. Surprisingly, he exited school with low prospects, went into acting, and to the astonishment of his parents, was on stage with the great Olivier at the Old Vic in just ten years. He largely achieved it alone, even though back then financial aid was available to go to Rada – a way up for actors from humble backgrounds. His father was always amazed with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: when he asked Anthony to recite the Yorick speech from Hamlet, Richard listened carefully and then left the room and burst into tears.

Regarding the fiery, stubborn individual, he quit the National Theatre company in a fit of pique – causing Olivier's regret and displeasure – but lucked into an excellent television part as a suspected war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which paved the way to characters including in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey on screen, which he preferred over theater. And he quit booze in 1975 once a notorious drinker, and thus made it through midlife to execute great performances, like Hannibal Lecter, the butler Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson featuring Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the later sections of the book he appears more reserved, more calculated. A few tales doesn't quite come off. He mentions having lunch alongside his cast mate in Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Sorvino, who wanted to tell him his acting as Nixon wasn't working. Was this the opportunity for Hopkins to learn a lesson from the famous actor of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Hardly. He tends to concur with Stone's rejection that Sorvino was acting by jealousy. Really?

He often portrays the tough, down-to-earth professional actor who believes you must to arrive punctually, learn everyone's name on set and get on with it. Quite so. However, he also describes standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who brought a background actor to tears: “Apologise to her! And develop some respect. If you ever repeat that around me, I'll rearrange your face! He appears to be someone who gave up drink but possibly not the combativeness that went with it. A classical performer like Hopkins surely knows Cornwall's lines on Kent from Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! A truthful and simple spirit – he must speak truth!”

Hopkins concludes his book with a detailed supplement composed simply