🔗 Share this article

Many consider it the most iconic appearance in cinematic history – yet the actor stays utterly motionless.

Clarice Starling, a rookie, navigates a row of prison cells finally encountering Hannibal Lecter's transparent prison. There he stands, appearing as a skeletal visage radiating satanic malice, chillingly static in his form-fitting blue prison jumpsuit. He doesn't move until the moment he throws himself toward the window, making that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. Countless true-crime documentaries have since shown that real-life murderers tend to be quite dull, lacking anything like the actor's commanding screen presence.

Hopkins was hardly a newcomer when he landed that Oscar-winning role in The Silence of the Lambs in 1989: it wasn't his debut, instead, a superstar was forged. His Dr. Lecter drew influence, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in this new autobiography, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Stalin according to his daughter's memories, as well as his icily exacting Rada tutor his mentor Fettes. Additionally, there existed a father-daughter dimension within the narrative; a difficult topic for Hopkins, who further explains how his portrayal of Lear was unknowingly shaped by painful regret regarding his daughter Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his disastrous first marriage back in 1966 to Petronella Barker, who was angered by his absences and his drinking habits.

The book's name comes from an old wartime photo of Hopkins as a toddler playing on the sand with his father – the kid who maybe thought he would never do OK. He was a bewildered, lonely, vulnerable little boy hailing from Port Talbot, the child of Richard Hopkins, the memorable figure in the narrative: a pastry chef and a traditional male, a direct communicator who despised the religious hypocrites at the church and refused to displaying emotion, yet possessed a touch of dreamy, sentimental tenderness. His father who deeply disliked the necessity of going cap-in-hand to affluent family members including Auntie Patty, who was connected to the famous Bevan and was able to secure Anthony as a boy into an elite school: “Since they are extremely wealthy!” he raves in the car on the way there. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The humility worked, for a while. Hopkins was a hopeless student at his new school. Then, during in an English lesson he had to recite the poem by Masefield titled The West Wind – without prior preparation – and that voice came to life; he amazed the instructor and his classmates. He convincingly states that verse, by itself, launched him. Combined with participating in the YMCA theater group. Remarkably, he left school with low prospects, entered the acting world, and shocking his family, was performing with the great Olivier at the renowned Old Vic in under a decade. He more or less did it on his own, though at that time financial aid was available to attend Rada – a path to success for actors from humble backgrounds. His dad remained in awe of Anthony's global success: when he asked Anthony to perform the Yorick monologue from Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then left the room and burst into tears.

Concerning the volatile, strong-willed son, he departed the theatrical troupe in a moment of anger – to Olivier's profound dismay and displeasure – but fortunately found a memorable TV character as a suspected war criminal in Leon Uris's QB VII, which paved the way to characters including in the film The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey on screen, that he favored to the stage. He gave up alcohol during the mid-70s after being a heavy drinker, and thus made it into middle age to deliver outstanding roles, including Lecter, the servant Stevens in The Remains of the Day featuring Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in his film The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the latter half of his autobiography his personality becomes more opaque, more deliberate. Some of the anecdotage doesn't quite come off. He remembers having lunch by his co-star in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the highly regarded performer Paul, who intended to inform him his performance as Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the opportunity for him to absorb a lesson from the famous actor of the Goodfellas fame? Not really. Anthony appears to agree with Stone's rejection of Sorvino as being motivated due to resentment. Really?

He consistently acts as the tough, down-to-earth professional actor who believes you must to arrive punctually, learn everyone's name on set and do the job. Indeed. However, he also describes facing a rude director who'd made a young extra cry: “Apologise to her! And learn some manners. Should you ever act that way in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! He appears to be an individual who stopped drinking but possibly not the combativeness that went with it. An actor of his caliber surely knows the lines about Kent from Cornwall from Lear: “He is incapable of flattery! A truthful and simple spirit – he is compelled to be honest!”

Hopkins concludes his book with an extensive addendum composed simply