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Many consider it the most iconic appearance in movie lore – yet the actor stays completely still.

A young FBI agent, just starting out, must walk a corridor of cells finally encountering Dr. Lecter's transparent prison. There he stands, with features like an animated death's head exuding demonic evil, eerily immobile wearing a snug blue prison jumpsuit. He doesn't move before suddenly he lunges at the barrier, making that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. A multitude of documentaries on serial killers have since shown that actual serial killers tend to be quite dull, with nothing resembling the actor's captivating film persona.

Hopkins was hardly an unknown at the time he got that Oscar-winning role in the iconic film during the late 80s: he was already established, instead, a superstar emerged. His Dr. Lecter was based, the actor happily remembers in this new autobiography, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on the Soviet leader as recalled by his daughter, and also from his rigorously precise acting coach Christopher Fettes. There was also a father-daughter dimension within the narrative; a difficult topic for Anthony, who also describes how his King Lear was subconsciously influenced by an agonised guilt regarding his daughter Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his failed first union in 1966 with Petronella Barker, who resented him being away and drinking.

The memoir's title is derived from an historical picture of a young Hopkins playing on the sand with his father – the child who might have felt he would never do OK. He felt confused, isolated and sensitive child from Port Talbot, son of Richard Arthur Hopkins, the memorable figure here: a baker and a traditional male, a direct communicator who loathed the sanctimonious churchgoers in their community and refused to showing his emotions, but also exhibited wistful, tearful romanticism. It was Hopkins Sr who deeply disliked the way they had to go humbly to their rich relatives including Auntie Patty, who was connected to the famous Bevan and was able to secure young Anthony into a prestigious academy: “Since they are extremely wealthy!” he raves while traveling there. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The pleading was effective, for a time. Hopkins was a hopeless student at the prestigious school. Then, during in a literature class he had to recite the poem by Masefield titled The West Wind – without seeing it first – and his voice awakened; he amazed the instructor and his classmates. He says quite plausibly that poetry, on its own, started his career. Combined with participating in the YMCA theater group. Remarkably, he left school with low prospects, went into acting, and shocking his family, was on stage with the great Olivier at the famous theater in just ten years. He more or less did it on his own, even though back then financial aid was available for drama school – a path to success for working-class actors. His father was always amazed with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: on asking his son to recite the Yorick speech from Shakespeare's Hamlet, Richard listened carefully and then retreated to another room and burst into tears.

Concerning the volatile, strong-willed son, he quit the National Theatre company in a fit of pique – to Olivier's profound dismay and disapproval – but lucked into an excellent television part as a suspected war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which paved the way to parts like that in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a thriving starry career in cinema, which he preferred to the stage. He gave up alcohol during the mid-70s after being a heavy drinker, and so survived through midlife to execute great performances, like Hannibal Lecter, the butler Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson alongside Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in the movie The Father – his second Academy Award.

In the later sections of his autobiography he appears more reserved, more calculated. A few tales doesn't quite come off. He remembers going out for lunch with his fellow actor in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Paul Sorvino, who intended to inform him his performance as Nixon wasn't effective. Was this the opportunity for him to absorb something from the legendary star of the Goodfellas fame? Not exactly. Anthony appears to agree with Stone's rejection that Sorvino was acting out of envy. Truly?

He repeatedly performs the tough, down-to-earth professional actor who believes it is one's responsibility to be on time, know all the crew's names and do the job. Absolutely. Yet he also tells standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who brought a background actor to tears: “Apologize to that girl! And develop some respect. You ever do that again around me, I'll rearrange your face! Anthony comes across as someone who gave up drink but maybe not the belligerence that accompanied it. A classical performer like Hopkins surely knows Cornwall's lines on Kent from the play Lear: “He is incapable of flattery! A truthful and simple spirit – he must speak truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with a detailed supplement composed simply