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It stands as the most iconic entrance in cinematic history – and he remains utterly motionless.

Clarice Starling, a rookie, proceeds down a corridor of cells until she reaches Hannibal Lecter's transparent prison. He is positioned, with features like a living skull exuding demonic evil, eerily immobile in his form-fitting blue prison jumpsuit. He doesn't move right up until he lunges against the glass, making that unforgettable spitting-growling noise. Countless true-crime documentaries have since demonstrated that genuine criminals are often very boring, with nothing resembling Anthony Hopkins's captivating film persona.

He wasn't exactly unrecognized upon receiving that Oscar-winning role in The Silence of the Lambs during the late 80s: it wasn't his debut, instead, a superstar was cemented. The character of Hannibal was based, Hopkins notes with amusement in this new autobiography, from Lugosi's Dracula, on Stalin based on his daughter's accounts, and on his own strictly demanding drama teacher Christopher Fettes. Additionally, there existed a paternal-filial aspect to these scenes; a sore point for Hopkins, who further explains how his portrayal of Lear was subconsciously influenced by an agonised guilt regarding his daughter Abigail, his distant daughter 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 Hopkins as a toddler with his father at the seaside – the child who might have felt he couldn't make it. He felt confused, shy and fragile youth hailing from Port Talbot, the child of Richard Hopkins, the standout secondary character in the narrative: a bread-maker and a traditional male, a plain speaker who despised the religious hypocrites of the chapel and refused to expressing his feelings, but had a streak of nostalgic, emotional sentimentality. His father who was angered by how they were forced humbly to affluent family members such as Aunt Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with the famous Bevan and was able to secure Anthony as a boy into a posh school: “Due to their immense riches!” he exclaims in the car on the way there. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Bloody rubbish, that's what it is!”

The grovelling paid off, for a time. Hopkins was a hopeless student at the prestigious school. However, one day during an English class he needed to deliver John Masefield's poem The West Wind – sight unseen – and his voice awakened; he stunned the teacher and the other boys. He says quite plausibly that verse, by itself, started his career. This, along with enrolling in the YMCA theater group. Notably, he graduated without much hope, entered the acting world, and to the astonishment of his parents, was acting alongside Laurence Olivier at the famous theater in under a decade. He largely achieved it alone, although in those days financial aid was available to attend Rada – a way up for actors from humble backgrounds. His father was always amazed with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: upon requesting his son to deliver the Yorick lines from the play Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then left the room and burst into tears.

As for the hot-tempered, stubborn individual, he quit the National Theatre company in a fit of pique – to Olivier's profound dismay and displeasure – but lucked into a great TV role playing an alleged war criminal in Leon Uris's QB VII, which eventually resulted to characters including in the film The Elephant Man and a successful acting career in cinema, that he favored compared to stage acting. He stopped drinking in 1975 having been a hell-raising alcoholic, and thus made it through midlife to deliver outstanding roles, including Lecter, the butler Stevens in The Remains of the Day with Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in The Father – his second Academy Award.

During the second part of the book his personality becomes more opaque, more deliberate. Some of the anecdotage doesn't quite come off. He remembers going out for lunch by his co-star in the film Nixon, the esteemed thespian Sorvino, who intended to inform him his acting as Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the moment for him to absorb advice from the renowned performer of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Not really. Anthony appears to agree with Stone's dismissal of Sorvino as being motivated by jealousy. Really?

He often portrays the tough, down-to-earth professional actor who maintains it is one's responsibility to get there on time, remember every crew member's name and do the job. Quite so. However, he also describes confronting an obnoxious director who brought a background actor to tears: “Say sorry to her! And develop some respect. Should you ever act that way around me, I'll rearrange your face! He appears to be an individual who stopped drinking but possibly not the combativeness that came with it. A Shakespearean like him must know Cornwall's speech regarding Kent in King Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! An honest mind and plain – he must speak truth!”

He finishes his autobiography with a detailed supplement composed simply