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It stands as the most iconic introduction in movie lore – yet the actor stays utterly motionless.

The FBI trainee, new to the job, proceeds down a row of prison cells until she reaches the notorious doctor's reinforced glass enclosure. There he stands, his face resembling a skeletal visage filled with sinister intent, eerily immobile wearing a snug blue prison jumpsuit. He remains motionless before suddenly he throws himself against the glass, making that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. Countless real-crime films have since demonstrated that genuine criminals are often very boring, lacking anything like Anthony Hopkins's commanding screen presence.

He wasn't exactly an unknown at the time he got that Oscar-winning role in the 1991 thriller back in 1989: a star wasn't born, but a legend was forged. His Dr. Lecter was based, Hopkins notes with amusement in his latest book, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Joseph Stalin according to his daughter's memories, and also from his strictly demanding acting coach his mentor Fettes. The scenes also contained a father-daughter dimension within the narrative; a painful subject for Hopkins, who recounts how his portrayal of Lear was indirectly affected by an agonised guilt concerning Abigail, his distant daughter from his disastrous first marriage during the 60s to his first wife, who resented him being away and drinking.

The title originates from a vintage war-era photograph of a young Hopkins playing on the sand with his father – the boy who perhaps believed he couldn't make it. He was a bewildered, shy and fragile youth hailing from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the standout secondary character here: a pastry chef and man's man, a plain speaker who despised the Bible-punching hypocrites at the church and didn't believe in expressing his feelings, yet possessed a touch of wistful, tearful romanticism. His father who was angered by the way they had to go begging to affluent family members including Auntie Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with Nye Bevan and could get Anthony as a boy into an elite school: “Due to their immense riches!” he raves in the car on the way there. “We are all expecting handouts! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The grovelling paid off, for a while. He was a poor student at his new school. However, one day in a literature class he was required to perform the poem by 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 poems, alone, started his career. This, along with enrolling in the dramatic society at the YMCA. Surprisingly, he exited school with low prospects, pursued acting, and amazingly to his parents, was on stage with the great Olivier at the famous theater in under a decade. He largely achieved it alone, even though back then scholarships existed for drama school – an opportunity for performers from modest means. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed of Anthony's global success: on asking his son to deliver the Yorick lines from Shakespeare's Hamlet, Richard listened carefully and then left the room and wept openly.

As for the hot-tempered, bloody-minded son, he departed the theatrical troupe in a moment of anger – causing Olivier's regret and displeasure – but lucked into an excellent television part as a suspected war criminal in the series QB VII, which eventually resulted to characters including in Lynch's The Elephant Man and a successful acting career on screen, that he favored to the stage. He stopped drinking during the mid-70s once a notorious drinker, and so survived into his later years to execute great performances, including Lecter, the servant Stevens in The Remains of the Day featuring Emma Thompson and the old man with dementia in the movie The Father – his second Academy Award.

In the later sections of his autobiography his character seems more elusive, more deliberate. Certain stories doesn't quite come off. He mentions going out for lunch by his co-star in the film Nixon, the much-respected actor Paul, who intended to inform him his acting as Nixon was falling short. Was this the chance for him to absorb something from the legendary star of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Not exactly. Anthony appears to agree with the director's criticism of Sorvino as driven out of envy. Is that so?

He often portrays the grounded, serious thespian who maintains you must to arrive punctually, learn everyone's name on set and get on with it. Quite so. Yet he also tells facing a rude director who'd made a young extra cry: “Say sorry to her! And develop some respect. If you ever repeat that in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! He appears to be a person who quit alcohol but possibly not the combativeness that went with it. An actor of his caliber is aware of Cornwall's speech regarding Kent from Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! A straightforward and sincere nature – he must speak truth!”

He finishes his autobiography with a lengthy appendix composed simply