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It stands as the greatest appearance in film history – yet the actor stays completely still.

A young FBI agent, new to the job, navigates the line of detention units arriving at Hannibal Lecter's secure glass tank. The man is present, with features like a skeletal visage radiating satanic malice, chillingly static in his form-fitting blue inmate uniform. He stands frozen until the moment he throws himself toward the window, making that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. A multitude of real-crime films have since demonstrated that genuine criminals are usually uninteresting, with nothing resembling Anthony Hopkins's captivating film persona.

He wasn't exactly unrecognized at the time he got his Academy Award-winning part in The Silence of the Lambs in 1989: it wasn't his debut, but a legend was cemented. His Dr. Lecter was inspired, the actor happily remembers in his latest book, from Lugosi's Dracula, on the Soviet leader as recalled by his daughter, and also from his strictly demanding acting coach his instructor Fettes. There was also a father-daughter dimension within the narrative; a painful subject for Hopkins, who also describes how his King Lear was indirectly affected by painful regret regarding his daughter Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his initial marriage in 1966 to his first wife, who was angered by his time away and his drinking habits.

The memoir's title is derived from a vintage war-era photograph of a young Hopkins playing on the sand with his father – the boy who perhaps believed he wouldn't succeed. He was a bewildered, isolated and sensitive child from Port Talbot, the child of Richard Hopkins, the scene-stealing supporting player here: a bread-maker and a traditional male, a direct communicator who despised the religious hypocrites of the chapel and didn't believe in expressing his feelings, but also exhibited wistful, tearful romanticism. Richard Hopkins who furiously resented how they were forced begging to affluent family members such as Aunt Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with Nye Bevan and was able to secure young Anthony into a prestigious academy: “Since they are extremely wealthy!” he raves while traveling there. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The humility worked, for a while. Anthony struggled academically at the prestigious school. Then, during in a literature class he needed to deliver the verse by John Masefield known as The West Wind – without seeing it first – and that voice came to life; he amazed the instructor and his classmates. He convincingly states that verse, by itself, started his career. This, along with enrolling in the dramatic society at the YMCA. Surprisingly, he exited school with low prospects, went into acting, and amazingly to his parents, was on stage with the great Olivier at the Old Vic within 10 years. He accomplished it mostly independently, though at that time scholarships existed to go to Rada – a path to success for working-class actors. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed by his son's international fame: on asking his son to recite the Yorick speech from Shakespeare's Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then went into another room and began crying.

As for the hot-tempered, stubborn individual, he departed the theatrical troupe in a moment of anger – to Olivier's profound dismay and criticism – but stumbled upon a memorable TV character as a suspected war criminal in the series QB VII, which led indirectly to characters including in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey in cinema, which he liked more compared to stage acting. He gave up alcohol back in 1975 after being a heavy drinker, and managed to live into his later years to execute great performances, such as Lecter, the servant Stevens in The Remains of the Day alongside Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in his film The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the latter half of the book his character seems more elusive, more studied. A few tales aren't entirely successful. He mentions going out for lunch with his fellow actor in the film Nixon, the esteemed thespian Paul Sorvino, who sought to advise him his performance as Nixon was falling short. Was this the chance for him to absorb a lesson from the famous actor from Goodfellas? Not exactly. He tends to concur with Stone's dismissal of Sorvino as driven due to resentment. Is that so?

He consistently acts as the no-nonsense, practical performer who thinks it's your duty to be on time, learn everyone's name on set and get on with it. Absolutely. Yet he also tells standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who'd made a young extra cry: “Apologise to her! And acquire some decency. If you ever repeat that near me, I'll alter your appearance!” Anthony comes across as a person who quit alcohol but possibly not the combativeness 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! A truthful and simple spirit – he is compelled to be honest!”

Hopkins concludes his book with an extensive addendum composed simply