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

Widely regarded as the most iconic entrance in film history – yet the actor stays without moving a muscle.

The FBI trainee, a rookie, navigates the line of detention units finally encountering Dr. Lecter's reinforced glass enclosure. The man is present, his face resembling an animated death's head exuding demonic evil, unnervingly still clad in a tight prisoner's blue outfit. He stands frozen right up until he lunges toward the window, producing that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. Numerous real-crime films have since demonstrated that actual serial killers tend to be quite dull, with nothing resembling Hopkins' captivating film persona.

Hopkins was hardly unrecognized at the time he got that Oscar-winning role in The Silence of the Lambs back in 1989: he was already established, but rather a megastar was forged. His portrayal of Lecter drew influence, Hopkins notes with amusement in this new autobiography, on the classic Dracula, on Stalin as recalled by his daughter, and on his own strictly demanding drama teacher Christopher Fettes. Additionally, there existed a parent-child dynamic within the narrative; a painful subject for the actor, who also describes how his portrayal of Lear was unknowingly shaped by an agonised guilt concerning Abigail, his distant daughter from his initial marriage during the 60s to Petronella Barker, who resented his absences and his drinking habits.

The memoir's title is derived from a vintage war-era photograph of a young Hopkins playing on the sand with his father – the kid who maybe thought he would never do OK. He appeared lost, isolated and sensitive child raised in Port Talbot, the child of Richard Hopkins, the scene-stealing supporting player in this story: a pastry chef and man's man, a straightforward talker who loathed the sanctimonious churchgoers of the chapel and refused to showing his emotions, yet possessed a touch of dreamy, sentimental tenderness. It was Hopkins Sr who furiously resented the necessity of going cap-in-hand to affluent family members such as Aunt Patty, whose spouse was acquainted with the famous Bevan and was able to secure young Anthony into a prestigious academy: “Because they're bloody rich!” he raves while traveling there. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The grovelling paid off, temporarily. Hopkins was a hopeless student in his new institution. However, one day in a literature class he needed to deliver the verse by John Masefield titled The West Wind – sight unseen – and that voice came to life; he amazed the instructor and the other students. He says quite plausibly that poetry, on its own, propelled him forward. Combined with participating in the YMCA theater group. Remarkably, he left school without much hope, went into acting, and shocking his family, was performing with the great Olivier at the famous theater within 10 years. He largely achieved it alone, although in those days scholarships existed to go to Rada – a way up for working-class actors. His dad remained in awe by his son's international fame: upon requesting his son to deliver the Yorick lines from Shakespeare's Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then left the room and burst into tears.

As for the hot-tempered, stubborn individual, he quit the National Theatre company in a fit of pique – much to Olivier's disappointment and criticism – but stumbled upon an excellent television part as a potential war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which led indirectly to parts like that in Lynch's The Elephant Man and a thriving starry career in movies, which he liked more over theater. He gave up alcohol in 1975 after being a heavy drinker, and thus made it into middle age to execute great performances, such as Lecter, the butler Stevens in the film The Remains of the Day featuring Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the later sections of his autobiography he appears more reserved, more calculated. Some of the anecdotage aren't entirely successful. He recalls going out for lunch with his fellow actor in Stone's Nixon, the much-respected actor Sorvino, who wanted to tell him his performance as Nixon wasn't working. Was this the moment for him to absorb a lesson from the famous actor from Goodfellas? Not exactly. Anthony appears to agree with Stone's dismissal of Sorvino as being motivated due to resentment. Truly?

He often portrays the no-nonsense, practical performer who thinks you must to arrive punctually, remember every crew member's name and proceed with the work. Absolutely. However, he also describes confronting an obnoxious director who'd made a young extra cry: “Apologize to that girl! And acquire some decency. You ever do that again in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! Hopkins sounds like a person who quit alcohol yet perhaps not the aggression that accompanied it. A classical performer like Hopkins surely knows the lines about Kent from Cornwall from Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! A straightforward and sincere nature – he is compelled to be honest!”

Anthony ends his memoir with an extensive addendum composed simply