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It stands as the most iconic introduction in movie lore – while he stands completely still.

A young FBI agent, new to the job, must walk a row of prison cells until she reaches the notorious doctor's reinforced glass enclosure. The man is present, appearing as a skeletal visage radiating satanic malice, unnervingly still clad in a tight prisoner's blue outfit. He remains motionless until the moment he lunges toward the window, making that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. Countless true-crime documentaries have since demonstrated that genuine criminals are usually uninteresting, lacking anything like Anthony Hopkins's commanding screen presence.

He wasn't exactly a newcomer upon receiving the part that won him an Oscar in the iconic film in 1989: it wasn't his debut, but a legend was cemented. His Dr. Lecter drew influence, Hopkins notes with amusement in his latest book, from Lugosi's Dracula, on Joseph Stalin as recalled by his daughter, and also from his rigorously precise drama teacher his mentor Fettes. The scenes also contained a father-daughter dimension within the narrative; a sore point for Hopkins, who recounts how his King Lear was indirectly affected by painful regret concerning Abigail, the estranged daughter from his disastrous first marriage in 1966 to his first wife, who disliked his absences and his alcohol use.

The book's name comes from an historical picture of a young Hopkins on the beach with his dad – the boy who perhaps believed he would never do OK. He was a bewildered, lonely, vulnerable little boy raised in Port Talbot, the child of Richard Hopkins, the standout secondary character in the narrative: a pastry chef and a traditional male, a plain speaker who detested the sanctimonious churchgoers at the church and avoided showing his emotions, yet possessed a touch of nostalgic, emotional sentimentality. Richard Hopkins who was angered by the way they had to go humbly to their wealthy relations including Auntie Patty, whose husband knew Nye Bevan and was able to secure Anthony as a boy into a prestigious academy: “Due to their immense riches!” he shouts while traveling there. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The humility worked, temporarily. Anthony struggled academically at the prestigious school. Then, during in an English lesson he needed to deliver John Masefield's poem titled The West Wind – without prior preparation – and his voice awakened; he amazed the instructor and the other boys. He convincingly states that verse, by itself, started his career. This, along with enrolling in the dramatic society at the YMCA. Surprisingly, he exited school a no-hoper, went into acting, and to the astonishment of his parents, was on stage alongside Laurence Olivier at the Old Vic in under a decade. He more or less did it on his own, though at that time scholarships existed to go to Rada – a path to success for working-class actors. His dad remained in awe by his son's international fame: on asking his son to recite the Yorick speech from Shakespeare's Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then left the room and burst into tears.

As for the hot-tempered, bloody-minded son, he left the National Theatre out of frustration – much to Olivier's disappointment and disapproval – but stumbled upon an excellent television part as a potential war criminal in Leon Uris's QB VII, which paved the way to characters including in the film The Elephant Man and a successful acting career in cinema, which he preferred compared to stage acting. He stopped drinking back in 1975 having been a hell-raising alcoholic, and so survived into middle age to achieve remarkable acting, like Hannibal Lecter, the butler Stevens in the film The Remains of the Day with Emma Thompson and the senior with memory loss in his film The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the later sections of the book his personality becomes more opaque, more studied. Certain stories aren't entirely successful. He mentions having lunch alongside his cast mate in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Sorvino, who sought to advise him his acting as Nixon was falling short. Was this the chance for Anthony to gain insight a lesson from the famous actor from Goodfellas? Not really. Anthony appears to agree with Stone's dismissal of Sorvino as driven by jealousy. Is that so?

He often portrays the grounded, serious thespian who maintains it is one's responsibility to be on time, remember every crew member's name and get on with it. Absolutely. However, he also describes facing a rude director who'd made a young extra cry: “Say sorry to her! And acquire some decency. You ever do that again around me, I'll rearrange your face! Hopkins sounds like an individual who stopped drinking yet perhaps not the aggression that came with it. A Shakespearean like him surely knows Cornwall's speech regarding Kent in King Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! An honest mind and plain – he always tells the truth!”

Hopkins concludes his book with a lengthy appendix composed simply