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Widely regarded as the most memorable introduction in movie lore – and he remains completely still.

A young FBI agent, just starting out, must walk a corridor of cells until she reaches Dr. Lecter's reinforced glass enclosure. He is positioned, his face resembling a skeletal visage filled with sinister intent, eerily immobile wearing a snug blue prison jumpsuit. He stands frozen right up until he throws himself toward the window, emitting that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. Countless true-crime documentaries have since shown that actual serial killers tend to be quite dull, far from Anthony Hopkins's powerful on-screen charisma.

Hopkins was hardly an unknown upon receiving the part that won him an Oscar in the 1991 thriller back in 1989: it wasn't his debut, instead, a superstar was forged. His Dr. Lecter was inspired, the actor happily remembers in his latest book, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Stalin as recalled by his daughter, as well as his icily exacting acting coach his instructor Fettes. There was also a father-daughter dimension within the narrative; a painful subject for Anthony, who also describes how his King Lear was unknowingly shaped by an agonised guilt about Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his initial marriage back in 1966 to his first wife, who resented him being away and drinking.

The book's name comes from an old wartime photo of a young Hopkins with his father at the seaside – the child who might have felt he couldn't make it. He appeared lost, shy and fragile youth from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the standout secondary character in this story: a pastry chef and a tough individual, a direct communicator who despised the Bible-punching hypocrites in their community and avoided expressing his feelings, but had a streak of dreamy, sentimental tenderness. Richard Hopkins who deeply disliked how they were forced cap-in-hand to affluent family members such as Aunt Patty, who was connected to the politician Nye Bevan and helped enroll Anthony as a boy into a posh school: “Because they're bloody rich!” he exclaims in the car on the way there. “We are all expecting handouts! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The pleading was effective, for a time. Anthony struggled academically at the prestigious school. Then, during in an English lesson he was required to perform John Masefield's poem The West Wind – sight unseen – and his talent emerged; he amazed the instructor and the other boys. He convincingly states that poems, alone, propelled him forward. This, and joining the YMCA drama club. Remarkably, he left school a no-hoper, entered the acting world, and amazingly to his parents, was performing with the great Olivier at the Old Vic in under a decade. He largely achieved it alone, though at that time there were grants to attend Rada – an opportunity for actors from humble backgrounds. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed of Anthony's global success: when he asked Anthony to recite the Yorick speech from the play Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then retreated to another room and burst into tears.

As for the hot-tempered, bloody-minded son, he departed the theatrical troupe in a fit of pique – to Olivier's profound dismay and displeasure – but stumbled upon 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 Lynch's The Elephant Man and a successful acting career in cinema, which he liked more to the stage. And he quit booze in 1975 after being a heavy drinker, and managed to live into middle age to achieve remarkable acting, such as Lecter, the butler Stevens in the film The Remains of the Day featuring Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in his film The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the latter half of the book his character seems more elusive, more deliberate. Certain stories doesn't quite come off. He mentions going out for lunch alongside his cast mate in Oliver Stone's Nixon, the much-respected actor Paul, who intended to inform him his performance as Nixon wasn't working. Was this the opportunity for Hopkins to learn something from the legendary star of the Goodfellas fame? Hardly. Hopkins seems to go along with the director's criticism that Sorvino was acting by jealousy. Really?

He often portrays the no-nonsense, practical performer who thinks it's your duty to arrive punctually, know all the crew's names and get on with it. Absolutely. But he also recounts standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who brought a background actor to tears: “Say sorry to her! And acquire some decency. Should you ever act that way in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! Anthony comes across as a person who quit alcohol but maybe not the belligerence that accompanied it. An actor of his caliber surely knows the lines about Kent from Cornwall from Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! A straightforward and sincere nature – he must speak truth!”

Hopkins concludes his book with a detailed supplement composed simply