🔗 Share this article

Many consider it the greatest appearance in film history – yet the actor stays utterly motionless.

The FBI trainee, new to the job, navigates the line of detention units until she reaches Dr. Lecter's transparent prison. There he stands, appearing as a skeletal visage exuding demonic evil, chillingly static in his form-fitting blue inmate uniform. He remains motionless until the moment he lunges against the glass, making that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. Numerous documentaries on serial killers have since shown that genuine criminals tend to be quite dull, far from Hopkins' commanding screen presence.

Hopkins was hardly a newcomer at the time he got that Oscar-winning role in the 1991 thriller during the late 80s: he was already established, but rather a megastar was cemented. His portrayal of Lecter was based, the actor happily remembers in this new autobiography, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Joseph Stalin as recalled by his daughter, and on his own strictly demanding drama teacher his mentor Fettes. There was also a father-daughter dimension to these scenes; a painful subject for Hopkins, who further explains how his Lear was unknowingly shaped by painful regret regarding his daughter Abigail, his distant daughter from his disastrous first marriage during the 60s with Petronella Barker, who disliked him being away and drinking.

The memoir's title is derived from a vintage war-era photograph of a young Hopkins on the beach with his dad – the child who might have felt he would never do OK. He was a bewildered, lonely, vulnerable little boy raised in Port Talbot, the child of Richard Hopkins, the scene-stealing supporting player here: a bread-maker and a tough individual, a straightforward talker 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 deeply disliked the necessity of going cap-in-hand to affluent family members including Auntie Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with the politician Nye Bevan and was able to secure young Anthony into a prestigious academy: “Due to their immense riches!” he raves while traveling there. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Bloody rubbish, that's what it is!”

The pleading was effective, for a time. He was a poor student in his new institution. But one day during an English class he had to recite the verse by John Masefield titled The West Wind – without seeing it first – and that voice came to life; he shocked the educator and the other students. He says quite plausibly that verse, by itself, launched him. This, along with enrolling in the YMCA drama club. Notably, he graduated with low prospects, pursued acting, and shocking his family, was acting alongside Laurence Olivier at the Old Vic in under a decade. He largely achieved it alone, though at that time scholarships existed to go to Rada – an opportunity for working-class actors. His dad remained in awe with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: upon requesting his son to recite the Yorick speech from the play Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then left the room and burst into tears.

Concerning the volatile, stubborn individual, he left the National Theatre in a moment of anger – causing Olivier's regret and criticism – but stumbled upon a memorable TV character playing an alleged war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which led indirectly to characters including in Lynch's The Elephant Man and a thriving starry career in movies, which he liked more compared to stage acting. He gave up alcohol in 1975 once a notorious drinker, and managed to live into middle age to deliver outstanding roles, such as Lecter, the steward Stevens in The Remains of the Day alongside Emma Thompson and the senior with memory loss in the movie The Father – his second Academy Award.

During the second part of the book his personality becomes more opaque, more calculated. Certain stories fall a bit flat. He recalls going out for lunch alongside his cast mate in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Paul Sorvino, who wanted to tell him his performance 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. He tends to concur with Stone's dismissal that Sorvino was acting by jealousy. Is that so?

He consistently acts as the no-nonsense, practical performer who maintains it's your duty to arrive punctually, know all the crew's names and proceed with the work. Quite so. However, he also describes standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who'd made a young extra cry: “Apologise to her! And learn some manners. You ever do that again in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! Hopkins sounds like an individual who stopped drinking yet perhaps not the aggression that came with it. A classical performer like Hopkins is aware of Cornwall's lines on Kent from the play Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! A truthful and simple spirit – he always tells the truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with a detailed supplement composed simply