Anthony Hopkins' Memoir: We Did OK, Kid – Insights: A Legend with a Temper

Many consider it the most memorable entrance in cinematic history – and he remains completely still.

A young FBI agent, new to the job, proceeds down a row of prison cells until she reaches Hannibal Lecter's reinforced glass enclosure. He is positioned, with features like a living skull filled with sinister intent, chillingly static clad in a tight prisoner's blue outfit. He doesn't move right up until he propels himself against the glass, emitting that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. Numerous true-crime documentaries have since revealed that real-life murderers tend to be quite dull, with nothing resembling Hopkins' powerful on-screen charisma.

He wasn't exactly unrecognized upon receiving the part that won him an Oscar in the 1991 thriller during the late 80s: it wasn't his debut, but rather a megastar was cemented. His Dr. Lecter drew influence, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in his latest book, on the classic Dracula, on Joseph Stalin based on his daughter's accounts, and on his own rigorously precise acting coach his mentor Fettes. The scenes also contained a father-daughter dimension within the narrative; a difficult topic for Anthony, who further explains how his Lear was unknowingly shaped by an agonised guilt regarding his daughter Abigail, his distant daughter from his disastrous first marriage in 1966 to his first wife, who was angered by him being away and his alcohol use.

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 wouldn't succeed. He was a bewildered, lonely, vulnerable little boy hailing from Port Talbot, the child of Richard Hopkins, the memorable figure here: a bread-maker and a tough individual, a plain speaker who despised the sanctimonious churchgoers of the chapel and refused to displaying emotion, but also exhibited nostalgic, emotional sentimentality. His father who furiously resented the necessity of going humbly to their wealthy relations including Auntie Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with the politician Nye Bevan and could get Anthony as a boy into a posh school: “Because they're bloody rich!” he raves while traveling there. “We are all expecting handouts! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The pleading was effective, for a time. He was a poor student in his new institution. Then, during during an English class he needed to deliver the poem by Masefield titled The West Wind – sight unseen – and his voice awakened; he stunned the teacher and the other students. He reasonably claims that poems, alone, propelled him forward. Combined with participating 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 performing with Laurence Olivier at the renowned Old Vic in under a decade. He accomplished it mostly independently, though at that time there were grants for drama school – a way up for actors from humble backgrounds. His dad remained in awe with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: when he asked Anthony to deliver the Yorick lines from Shakespeare's Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then went into another room and wept openly.

Regarding the fiery, bloody-minded son, he left the National Theatre out of frustration – to Olivier's profound dismay and criticism – 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 characters including in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a successful acting career on screen, that he favored to the stage. And he quit booze during the mid-70s once a notorious drinker, and thus made it through midlife to achieve remarkable acting, like Hannibal Lecter, the steward Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson featuring Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in The Father – his second Oscar.

In the later sections of his autobiography he appears more reserved, more deliberate. A few tales doesn't quite come off. He recalls going out for lunch alongside his cast mate in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Sorvino, who wanted to tell him his acting as Nixon was falling short. Was this the chance for Hopkins to learn a lesson from the famous actor from Goodfellas? Not exactly. Anthony appears to agree with Stone's dismissal that Sorvino was acting due to resentment. Truly?

He consistently acts as the no-nonsense, practical performer who maintains it is one's responsibility to get there on time, know all the crew's names and do the job. Indeed. But he also recounts confronting an obnoxious director who caused a young extra to weep: “Apologise to her! And acquire some decency. If you ever repeat that near me, I'll alter your appearance!” Hopkins sounds like an individual who stopped drinking yet perhaps not the aggression that came with it. An actor of his caliber is aware of the lines about Kent from Cornwall from Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! An honest mind and plain – he is compelled to be honest!”

He finishes his autobiography with a lengthy appendix composed simply