🔗 Share this article

Many consider it the greatest appearance in film history – and he remains utterly motionless.

The FBI trainee, new to the job, proceeds down the line of detention units finally encountering Dr. Lecter's transparent prison. He is positioned, his face resembling a living skull filled with sinister intent, chillingly static clad in a tight blue inmate uniform. He remains motionless right up until he throws himself against the glass, emitting that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. Countless documentaries on serial killers have since revealed that real-life murderers tend to be quite dull, far from the actor's captivating film persona.

He wasn't exactly unrecognized upon receiving the part that won him an Oscar in The Silence of the Lambs during the late 80s: a star wasn't born, but a legend emerged. The character of Hannibal was based, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in his recent memoir, on the classic Dracula, on Joseph Stalin according to his daughter's memories, and on his own strictly demanding Rada tutor his mentor Fettes. Additionally, there existed a parent-child dynamic in these moments; a sore point for Hopkins, who recounts how his Lear was subconsciously influenced by painful regret concerning Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his failed first union during the 60s to Petronella Barker, who resented his absences and drinking.

The title originates from an historical picture of Hopkins as a toddler playing on the sand with his father – the boy who perhaps believed he couldn't make it. He appeared lost, shy and fragile youth raised in Port Talbot, the child of Richard Hopkins, the standout secondary character in this story: a baker and a traditional male, a direct communicator who detested the religious hypocrites of the chapel and refused to showing his emotions, but also exhibited wistful, tearful romanticism. His father who was angered by the necessity of going cap-in-hand to affluent family members including Auntie Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with the politician Nye Bevan and helped enroll the young Anthony into a prestigious academy: “Because they're bloody rich!” he raves in the car on the way there. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Bloody rubbish, that's what it is!”

The humility worked, for a time. Anthony struggled academically in his new institution. Then, during in an English lesson he was required to perform the verse by John Masefield The West Wind – without seeing it first – and that voice came to life; he amazed the instructor and the other students. He convincingly states that verse, by itself, started his career. This, along with enrolling in the YMCA theater group. Remarkably, he left school with low prospects, pursued acting, and shocking his family, was performing alongside Laurence Olivier at the famous theater within 10 years. He accomplished it mostly independently, even though back then there were grants to go to Rada – an opportunity for working-class actors. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed of Anthony's global success: when he asked Anthony to perform the Yorick monologue from Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then retreated to another room and wept openly.

As for the hot-tempered, strong-willed son, he quit the National Theatre company in a moment of anger – much to Olivier's disappointment and criticism – but lucked into a great TV role as a potential war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which led indirectly to parts like that in Lynch's The Elephant Man and a successful acting career on screen, which he preferred compared to stage acting. He stopped drinking in 1975 having been a hell-raising alcoholic, and managed to live through midlife to execute great performances, like Hannibal Lecter, the butler Stevens in The Remains of the Day alongside Emma Thompson and the senior with memory loss in his film The Father – his next Oscar win.

During the second part of the book he appears more reserved, more calculated. A few tales doesn't quite come off. He mentions going out for lunch with his fellow actor in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Sorvino, who intended to inform him his acting as Nixon wasn't working. Was this the opportunity for Anthony to gain insight advice from the renowned performer of the Goodfellas fame? Not really. Anthony appears to agree with the director's criticism that Sorvino was acting out of envy. Is that so?

He consistently acts as the grounded, serious thespian who believes it's your duty to be on time, know all the crew's names and get on with it. Indeed. But he also recounts confronting an obnoxious director who'd made a young extra cry: “Apologise to her! And develop some respect. You ever do that again in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! Hopkins sounds like a person who quit alcohol but maybe not the belligerence that went with it. An actor of his caliber must know Cornwall's lines on Kent in King Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! An honest mind and plain – he must speak truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with an extensive addendum composed simply