🔗 Share this article

Many consider it the most memorable appearance in film history – while he stands utterly motionless.

The FBI trainee, new to the job, proceeds down the line of detention units until she reaches the notorious doctor's secure glass tank. The man is present, with features like a living skull filled with sinister intent, eerily immobile clad in a tight blue inmate uniform. He remains motionless right up until he lunges toward the window, emitting that unforgettable spitting-growling noise. Countless real-crime films have since demonstrated that actual serial killers are often very boring, far from Hopkins' captivating film persona.

He wasn't exactly an unknown upon receiving the part that won him an Oscar in The Silence of the Lambs during the late 80s: a star wasn't born, instead, a superstar was cemented. His portrayal of Lecter was based, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in his recent memoir, from Lugosi's Dracula, on Joseph Stalin based on his daughter's accounts, and on his own icily exacting Rada tutor his instructor Fettes. The scenes also contained a paternal-filial aspect in these moments; a difficult topic for Hopkins, who also describes how his King Lear was indirectly affected by painful regret regarding his daughter Abigail, the estranged daughter from his disastrous first marriage in 1966 with Petronella Barker, who disliked his time away and his alcohol use.

The book's name comes from an historical picture of a young Hopkins with his father at the seaside – the kid who maybe thought he couldn't make it. He was a bewildered, shy and fragile youth hailing from Port Talbot, son of Richard Arthur Hopkins, the memorable figure in this story: a baker and a traditional male, a direct communicator who despised the Bible-punching hypocrites of the chapel and refused to expressing his feelings, yet possessed a touch of wistful, tearful romanticism. His father who furiously resented the way they had to go humbly to affluent family members like Auntie Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with Nye Bevan and helped enroll young Anthony into an elite school: “Because they're bloody rich!” he raves while traveling there. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The grovelling paid off, for a time. He was a poor student at his new school. However, one day in a literature class he was required to perform the verse by John Masefield The West Wind – without prior preparation – and his voice awakened; he shocked the educator and his classmates. He reasonably claims that poems, alone, propelled him forward. Combined with participating in the YMCA theater group. Notably, he graduated with low prospects, pursued acting, and shocking his family, was acting with the great Olivier at the famous theater in just ten years. He largely achieved it alone, even though back then scholarships existed to attend Rada – an opportunity for performers from modest means. His dad remained in awe by his son's international fame: upon requesting his son to perform the Yorick monologue from Shakespeare's Hamlet, Richard listened carefully and then went into another room and wept openly.

As for the hot-tempered, strong-willed son, he departed the theatrical troupe in a fit of pique – much to Olivier's disappointment and disapproval – but lucked into a great TV role as a potential war criminal in the series QB VII, which eventually resulted to parts like that in the film The Elephant Man and a successful acting career on screen, which he preferred over theater. He gave up alcohol during the mid-70s once a notorious drinker, and thus made it into middle age to achieve remarkable acting, such as Lecter, the steward Stevens in the film The Remains of the Day with Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in his film The Father – his second Academy Award.

During the second part of the memoir he appears more reserved, more deliberate. A few tales doesn't quite come off. He remembers going out for lunch alongside his cast mate in Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Paul Sorvino, who wanted to tell him his acting as Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the opportunity for Hopkins to learn a lesson from the famous actor of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Not exactly. Hopkins seems to go along with Stone's rejection that Sorvino was acting out of envy. Is that so?

He consistently acts as the no-nonsense, practical performer who maintains it is one's responsibility to be on time, learn everyone's name on set and get on with it. Indeed. However, he also describes facing a rude director who brought a background actor to tears: “Say sorry to her! And develop some respect. If you ever repeat that around me, I'll rearrange your face! Anthony comes across as an individual who stopped drinking but possibly not the combativeness that accompanied it. An actor of his caliber must know the lines about Kent from Cornwall from Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! An honest mind and plain – he must speak truth!”

He finishes his autobiography with an extensive addendum composed simply