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It stands as the most iconic introduction in film history – and he remains completely still.

A young FBI agent, just starting out, navigates a row of prison cells arriving at the notorious doctor's reinforced glass enclosure. There he stands, with features like an animated death's head filled with sinister intent, chillingly static wearing a snug blue inmate uniform. He stands frozen before suddenly he throws himself at the barrier, producing that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. Countless true-crime documentaries have since revealed that actual serial killers are usually uninteresting, lacking anything like Hopkins' captivating film persona.

Hopkins was hardly unrecognized when he landed the part that won him an Oscar in The Silence of the Lambs back in 1989: it wasn't his debut, but rather a megastar was cemented. The character of Hannibal was inspired, the actor happily remembers in his latest book, on the classic Dracula, on Stalin based on his daughter's accounts, and also from his rigorously precise drama teacher his instructor Fettes. The scenes also contained a parent-child dynamic in these moments; a painful subject for Hopkins, who further explains how his portrayal of Lear was unknowingly shaped by deep-seated remorse about Abigail, his distant daughter from his disastrous first marriage during the 60s to Petronella Barker, who disliked him being away and his alcohol use.

The book's name comes from a vintage war-era photograph of a young Hopkins with his father at the seaside – the child who might have felt he couldn't make it. He appeared lost, shy and fragile youth hailing from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the scene-stealing supporting player in the narrative: a bread-maker and man's man, a straightforward talker who despised the sanctimonious churchgoers at the church and refused to displaying emotion, but also exhibited nostalgic, emotional sentimentality. Richard Hopkins who furiously resented the way they had to go begging to affluent family members like Auntie Patty, who was connected to Nye Bevan and was able to secure Anthony as a boy into a posh school: “Because they're bloody rich!” he shouts in the car on the way there. “We are all expecting handouts! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The pleading was effective, for a while. He was a poor student at his new school. But one day in an English lesson he needed to deliver the poem by Masefield known as The West Wind – without prior preparation – and that voice came to life; he amazed the instructor and the other students. He convincingly states that poetry, on its own, propelled him forward. This, and joining the YMCA theater group. Surprisingly, he exited school a no-hoper, pursued acting, and to the astonishment of his parents, was on stage with the great Olivier at the Old Vic within 10 years. He more or less did it on his own, even though back then there were grants to go to Rada – a way up for performers from modest means. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed 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 burst into tears.

Regarding the fiery, stubborn individual, he departed the theatrical troupe out of frustration – to Olivier's profound dismay and criticism – but lucked into a memorable TV character as a potential war criminal in the series QB VII, which led indirectly to roles such as in Lynch's The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey in cinema, which he preferred compared to stage acting. And he quit booze in 1975 after being a heavy drinker, and thus made it into middle age to execute great performances, including Lecter, the butler Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson with Emma Thompson and the old man with dementia in his film The Father – his second Academy Award.

In the later sections of the book his character seems more elusive, more calculated. A few tales fall a bit flat. He remembers going out for lunch with his fellow actor in the film Nixon, the much-respected actor Sorvino, who sought to advise him his acting as Nixon wasn't working. Was this the chance for Hopkins to learn something from the legendary star of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Hardly. Hopkins seems to go along with the director's criticism of Sorvino as being motivated due to resentment. Really?

He consistently acts as the grounded, serious thespian who thinks you must to arrive punctually, know all the crew's names and get on with it. Quite so. Yet he also tells confronting an obnoxious director who brought a background actor to tears: “Apologize to that girl! And acquire some decency. You ever do that again around me, I'll rearrange your face! Anthony comes across as a person who quit alcohol but possibly not the combativeness that accompanied it. A Shakespearean like him must know the lines about Kent from Cornwall in King Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! An honest mind and plain – he always tells the truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with a detailed supplement composed simply