The Day Anthony Hopkins Quit Drinking | The Interview

How did you play Hannibal Lectar? Well,

I played the opposite of what they promised. Oh, he's a monster.

promised. Oh, he's a monster.

Good morning. You're not the real FBI, are you?

[Music] In so many of Sir Anthony Hopkins greatest performances, he's able to suggest captivating hidden depths to his characters.

A census taker once tried to test me. I

ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice cane.

There's always a sense these characters are thinking and feeling things that for whatever reason they're keeping to themselves.

Let me see it.

[Music] But in his new autobiography, Hopkins himself is laying his life bare, revealing details about his tough

childhood in Wales and his painful arangement from his only child. Hopkins

is 87 now, and he makes it clear in the book that he's grappling with life's bigger questions, the why of it all and what it means, and how mystified he feels by the sheer luck and

improbability of his unlikely life.

Here's my conversation with Anthony Hopkins.

Hello, David. Tony Hopkins.

Uh, I was wondering, do I go Sir Anthony? Is that

Anthony? Is that No, no, no. Tony,

nice to meet you.

Good to meet you.

You know, I thought it might be interesting to start with a a key epiphany that you write about in the book. You know, we we all have our

book. You know, we we all have our turning points in our lives. when you

have such a specific one and and know exactly when it happened. Um, a moment that sort of changed everything for you.

Can you tell me about what happened on December 29th, 1975 at 11:00?

Well, almost 50 years ago.

I'm always slightly reluctant to talk about it because I don't want to sound preachy or like a goodie two shoes, but I was drunk driving my car here in

California in a blackout.

No clue where I was going.

And it was a moment when I realized that I could have killed somebody or myself, which I didn't care about, but I could have killed a family in a car, you know.

And I realized that I was an alcoholic and I came to my senses and I said to

it was an ex agent of mine at this party in Beverly Hills. I said I need help. So

I made the fatal phone call to an intergroup in LA 12step program. So

we'll send somebody over to meet you. I

said no I'll come to you. So I went to this intergroup office. So 11:00

precisely, looked at my watch and this is the spooky part. Some deep

powerful thought or voice spoke to me from inside and said, "It's all over now. You can start living and it has all

now. You can start living and it has all been for a purpose. So don't forget one moment of it."

And it was just a voice from the blue from inside deep inside me. But it was vocal, male, reasonable like a radio voice

and it was a monotone. But it's all over. The craving to drink was taken

over. The craving to drink was taken from me or left. Now I don't know have any theories except I you know the divinity or that power that we all

possess inside us that creates us from birth life force whatever it is. It's a

consciousness. I believe that's all I know. But my whole life has been like

know. But my whole life has been like that. Shall I give you another epiphany?

that. Shall I give you another epiphany?

Mhm.

I'll go back to 1955 Easter.

And I was my school report had arrived, the dreaded school report. I was 17 and I was dreading this day because my

parents would read these terrible reports on my progress in school because I was a dummy.

I was known as Dennis the Dunce.

couldn't understand anything was going on. Resentful,

on. Resentful, lonely, and all that. I remember my father opening the report, the dreaded moment about 5:00 in the evening.

We were going to go go off to see a film. I remember beautiful spring day

film. I remember beautiful spring day and he opened the report and it said, "Anthony is way below the standard of

the school, which is a death now really." And my father said, "I don't

really." And my father said, "I don't know what's going to happen to you. I

don't know." Good. But he he was worried because and quite reasonably he'd spent a bit of money to give me an education and I wasn't capable of meeting that standard. I couldn't understand

standard. I couldn't understand anything. I my brain was sort of cut

anything. I my brain was sort of cut off. But I remember taking a slight move

off. But I remember taking a slight move away. He said, "One day I'll show you."

away. He said, "One day I'll show you."

My father looked at me. He said, "Well, I hope you do."

What at that moment what I decided was to stop playing the game of being stupid and a dummy. We step into circles of energy which are negative and we play a

role because it's easy to say well you know uh I'm not it's not meant for me that's well there's a truth in it but at

the same time you have to say wake up and live act as if it is impossible to fail. And

that's what I did.

You know, you you grew up the son of a baker, workingass in Wales, and I I can't imagine growing up that you knew

that many artists or actors. Um, was the idea of becoming an actor something that you or your family had ambivalence about?

No.

I think as a 17-year-old boy who didn't know anything really, something sparked me and I got a scholarship to an acting school in South Wales. I'd never acted

in my life, but I did an audition.

And uh they gave me a scholarship. How? I don't

know. And I remember, this is another thing. I remember going to see a play

thing. I remember going to see a play with the great Peter Oul at the Bristol Old Vic. He was playing Jimmy Porter in

Old Vic. He was playing Jimmy Porter in Look Back in Anger. And onto the stage came this lightning bolt, Peter Oul, very dangerous actor. And I thought,

God, if he stepped off the stage, he'd come and kill us all. And um 10 years later I was in the theater, the national

theater playing uh Andre in Lawrence Olivia's production of three sisters by Czechov knock on the door at the end of the evening who should be that Peter.

Now that's weird. And he said I want you to do a film test for me. It's a film with Katherine Heburn called The Lion and Winter.

Yeah. It was your first film.

Yeah. So I showed up and uh did the test.

He said, "Right, you've got it. You've

got the part." And he'd had a few to drink. And we had a few to drink after

drink. And we had a few to drink after that. Now that's beyond explanation to

that. Now that's beyond explanation to me. And I when I look at that film,

me. And I when I look at that film, which I do occasionally, I think, how on earth did that happen? Why me? I don't

know to this day why. And um I am what I am and I do what I do because I love doing it. It's all in the game.

doing it. It's all in the game.

Wonderful game called life. No sweat, no big deal. There are no big deals.

big deal. There are no big deals.

So, when you were uh a kid and you would hear your father or teachers say you were a dummy, uh I'm sure that

the voice your voice in your own head when you were younger also said, "I'm a dummy." That's right. H how did and I

dummy." That's right. H how did and I think people are are often in their lives and certainly true for me um you know we do battle with this voice in our

head that tells us we can't do things or we're stupid or whatever it may be. Um h

how did you quiet that voice or learn to control it?

Well, it's still there in me from childhood.

But what you do it now whispers.

So what I say shut up. So yeah, I just Yeah, thanks a lot. We all have problems. We've all got limitations.

But I do believe that if you say um wake up and live, act as if it is impossible, we actually tap into a power

that's in ourselves, which helps us to do well, not everything, but some things. I discovered that I could

things. I discovered that I could compose music. I discovered that I could

compose music. I discovered that I could write. had discovered through my lovely

write. had discovered through my lovely wife Stella that I could paint. And I

remember she was an example because she changed my life. She found some drawings in some old scripts of mine just after we got married. She said these drawings

you did these she you got to paint. I

said I can't paint. She said, "Of course you can. Just do it."

you can. Just do it."

So, I then bought some canvases and acrylic paints and pens and inks and I just do it.

I I have a a question about that. But

before I'm really having a hard time with these headphones.

Yeah.

All right. Sorry about that. We're We're

back.

Much bigger headphones now.

They look good.

All right. Good. Yeah. Thank you. Um,

you know, often when I've talked with actors, um, they've suggested that something about acting and something about their affinity for acting or gift

for acting, um, has to do with the way that acting fulfills something for them.

Is there anything that you find acting fulfills for you some some inner need?

Well, a need would sound rather sad. I

just enjoy it.

I enjoy the the scientific fun of it of learning a script or learning all the lines. And I'm very good at that. I I

lines. And I'm very good at that. I I

learn everything there is to about the the text that I'm studying because that reforms something in me. And I suppose on a deep psychological Yeah.

level I'm trying to escape from what I was. I don't know.

was. I don't know.

What is the thing you were trying to escape from? Well, that lonely kid, you

escape from? Well, that lonely kid, you know, and actually the vain surprise of saying I did it. I survived my loneliness. I

survived those bullies. Not that I blamed them. God bless them all. I mean,

blamed them. God bless them all. I mean,

I'm not a victim.

Mhm.

And you know, I if people choose to wallow in their well, okay, go ahead, but you're going to die. Um because you

can't do that. And that's why I drank to to um nullify that. uh discomfort or whatever it was than me because it made

me feel big. You know, booze is terrific because it makes you instantly feel in a different space and I enjoyed that. I didn't do it that long. I did it for 15 years. But I

long. I did it for 15 years. But I

remember think this is the life. All

actors in those days, P2, Richard Burton, all of them and you know they I remember those drinking sessions. Think

this is the life. We're rebels. We are

outsiders. So we can celebrate and at the back of the mind is and it'll kill you as well.

Ah and I remember thinking this is going to kill me the drinking.

Yeah. Cuz I was doing it I was drinking like it was going out of fashion and those guys who worked with it all gone and they were very talented people.

Wonderful. But once you get into that schizophrenic stage when your personality becomes uh uh rabid and from moment to moment

you're jolly nice guy in the bar and sudden you turn viciously say you talk to me like that's what was happening to me. you uh write about how you were

me. you uh write about how you were influenced by um older actors like uh Lawrence Olivier or or Katherine Heppern sort of helped you understand about film

acting but I was I was curious about whether any of the younger actors that you've worked with over the years people like you know Nicole Kidman or or Brad Pitt or Ryan Gosling

have they taught you anything about acting or or shown you anything about the craft?

Um, no, it's always been a pleasure to work with them. I mean, Brad and um, the everyone you've just mentioned.

Nothing but praise for them. I was

working with a young actor a few years ago, young Canadian actor who looked a bit like James Dean.

I think he thought he was James Dean.

But we were doing a scene together.

I said, "Can't hear a word you're saying." Huh? I can't hear you. Why are

saying." Huh? I can't hear you. Why are

you mumbling? I didn't want to spoil his day.

Yeah, but I said if you do that, you see that we'll go to the pub next door because you're supposed to tell us the story.

Speak up. Be clear. Wandering on like a backstreet Maron Brown is not going to help you at all in your career. I

never heard of him since. in reading the book and in reading um sort of older interviews with you or older articles about you, I think to me there's a a consistent

sense uh that comes from you that uh you know acting shouldn't really be taken that seriously. Actors are entertainers

that seriously. Actors are entertainers and and I wonder do you think acting has any greater claim on the truth?

No.

It's an entertainment.

Maybe it's an educational way of entertaining.

So, it has no deeper importance.

Not dismissing it, but I'm just saying, you know, if I start taking myself too seriously, I think it's only a job. It's only it's

only acting. So, for me, they're just

only acting. So, for me, they're just pastiches, little dabs of paint in one's life.

And not to be taken because at the moment when you get to a certain age in life, you're going through, you got ambitions, you got great dreams and everything's fine. And there on the

everything's fine. And there on the distant hill is death and you think, well, now is the time to wake up and live and really enjoy it.

Do do you feel like you achieved your dreams?

Oh, yeah. I I don't know if they were dreams. They just happened to me. uh

because I can't take credit for them at all. I I cannot I mean my life is a

all. I I cannot I mean my life is a mystery to me. I'm not trying to sound uh ultra modest or humble, but I have to confess that I don't

understand how it all happened. The miracle is I look at my hands, you know, my hands are

an 87 year old man's hands. Um, I'm

slowing down. Uh, and you know, my body's creaky, although I'm still strong. But the miracle of it is I'm

strong. But the miracle of it is I'm still here.

And that's not a mathematical formula.

That's a miracle of life that's in us all. The heart that still beats. I look

all. The heart that still beats. I look

at my cat. I watch him sleeping out for the count. And I look at the miracle of

the count. And I look at the miracle of his life. A little cat. The miracle, the

his life. A little cat. The miracle, the sheer miracle. To dismiss it is a

sheer miracle. To dismiss it is a sacrilege.

What uh what snaps you out of the miracle?

Uh my bad back.

That'll do it.

Yeah, but it's not even that bad. I, you

know, I get a bit of treatment lower back, bit of stiffness. Um and what I do now is slow down. I take everything very

slowly because, you know, I'm strong, my legs are strong, I work out.

But what I do is I take easy because one trip, one fall can kill you.

I mean, your age is, you know, it's it's a fact. It's it's undeniable, but it

a fact. It's it's undeniable, but it doesn't really seem from afar as if your uh productivity has slowed down. You you

work a lot. Um yeah, do you do you know what to do with yourself when you're not working?

I play the piano, I read, but why do you work so much is my real question. They off still offer me work.

question. They off still offer me work.

I don't know what's in their minds. They

may think I'm 40. I don't know if they give me these jobs to do. And I think, okay. And I think, well, if they're game

okay. And I think, well, if they're game to employ me, I hope I just show up fit and well and ready.

But what do you say yes to? I mean, do you just say yes to everything?

Anything I can.

Well, why not? No, I say yes. As long as it's a good script, not too far-fetched.

As long as the writing is good and directors amanable.

Uh, yeah, why not?

How often these days do you get a director who's not amanable?

Well, they're all amanable now.

Is that a change?

Uh, well, I used to in the past have a few problems with those days. There was

there were tyrant directors, tyrannical bullies. few of those. But when I used

bullies. few of those. But when I used to confront them, I would confront them in no uncertain terms. I'd say things like, "You talk to me like that."

like that." And you'll wake up with a crowd around you.

Whether I meant it or not, I don't know.

But I wouldn't put up with it. I said,

"Don't talk to me like that."

I said, "No, you shut up." And either they would or they wouldn't.

I remember working with a director who was giving notes to a young a young woman, fine actress, and he started shouting at her. I sold

it. You raise your voice one decel to this lady and I'm going and you my dear should leave as well. She said

after Thank you. I said, "How long has he been doing that? You should from the whole family." I said, "You should have

whole family." I said, "You should have told me. I can't even remember the exact

told me. I can't even remember the exact I think he's gone now. But no, I I defend people. Don't raise your voice.

defend people. Don't raise your voice.

It's a film. It's a stupid film. That's

all it is. It's not important. Doing

take after take after take after take.

Who cares?

Do Do you uh feel that any of the films that you've made would uh would you call them important?

No.

Not one.

The Elephant Man. Give me the elephant man.

Yeah, it was a good film.

The remains of the day.

Yeah, they were good. But

silence of the lambs.

Ah, but the the the the thing is, you know, about all that stuff. People ask me about silence of the lambs. How did you do that? I said, well, I am not Hannibal

do that? I said, well, I am not Hannibal Lecter. I am not a butler.

Lecter. I am not a butler.

I am not this and I'm not that. I'm just

a mechanic.

I show up no more. Somebody says, "How did you play the remains of the day that battle? How did you play him?" I said,

battle? How did you play him?" I said, "Well, I was very quiet, very still, and walked about quietly."

That's it.

How did you play Hannibal Lectar? Well,

I played the opposite of what they promised. Oh, he's a monster.

promised. Oh, he's a monster.

Good morning. You're not the real FBI, are you? gives me the heebie-jebies.

are you? gives me the heebie-jebies.

Don't do that because you play the opposite and it's easy.

This idea that um essentially life is a game. There are no big deals. Uh we

game. There are no big deals. Uh we

don't need to take anything so seriously. You just got to do the best

seriously. You just got to do the best you can. Um that's sort of a um in a way

you can. Um that's sort of a um in a way a recurring theme in uh in your book. Um

and I wonder if if we believe that you know we shouldn't take anything too seriously what what should we take seriously? What

does matter in life?

Well I don't mean to you know be irresponsibly irresponsibly indifferent to everything.

uh there are difficulties there are monstrous difficulties in life and yeah you take notice of them but finally and I think now approaching 88 years of age

I wake up in the morning think I'm still here how I don't know but whatever is keeping me I say thank you very much obliged

beyond my finite self there's not much I can do I I had a gift when I was a boy I that could suddenly learn lots of words of speeches from

Shakespeare and poems and all that. Now

at this age I look at those poems that I wrote down or they bring back clear memories of my childhood and I get very moved by it. I just have

to think of them. I get tearful not through sadness but through the wonder of having been alive having lived those years and my clear memories of Wales my clear memories of my parents and their

struggles and hardships after the war years you know they really struggle to make a living and to give me an education I look back with tremendous

gratitude and and I get kind of weepy because I remember the glory of being a child you know I had a good childhood I wasn't bright in school I was hopeless And I was bullied a lot. I was slapped

around. But I look back and I think,

around. But I look back and I think, well, that's part of growing up. And in

those days, teachers could knock you about. I remember being slapped across

about. I remember being slapped across the head uh by um a teacher several times because I didn't know something.

And what I would do, Veru would be called in the army dumb insulence. I

wouldn't respond. I just withdraw to myself and I'd stare at them blankly.

Yeah. Can you show me what that looked like because you referred to it a couple times in the book.

So I remember the the principal of the school slapping me on the head. He said,

"You're inadequate."

Do you know what I mean?

Yes. No.

You're inadequate. You got an empty brain. You're brainless.

brain. You're brainless.

There's the look. And it drove them nuts and they're all dead now.

You won.

I won.

But I don't know.

You know, the there I'd like to return to the material from the book for a second. And um

second. And um the specific material I'd like to uh uh focus on. I know it's uh sensitive for

focus on. I know it's uh sensitive for you. So if

you. So if I know what you're going to talk about, my domestic life.

Yes.

No. No. even though it's in the book.

No, it's done.

Can I ask a general question that's not specifically about the material in the book?

Well, but it's a about the I'll I'll stumble through this. Part of

the reason that the material in the book about your relationship with your daughter, your strange relationship with your daughter, part of the reason why I

found it so painful is that it resonated with me for personal reasons. Uh I've

seen my father, I think twice in 20 years. you know,

I've spoken to him once in in those 20 years, and I'm very curious about other people's experience of that kind of estrangement. In this instance, the

estrangement. In this instance, the estrangement is uh my choice, but I I just wonder if you have thoughts about where reconciliation might lie between

estranged parents and children.

My wife Stella sent an invitation to come and see us.

Not a word of response. So I think, okay, fine. I wish her well, but I'm not

okay, fine. I wish her well, but I'm not going to waste blood over that. If you

want to waste your life being in resentment, oh 50 years later, 58 years later, fine. Go ahead.

later, fine. Go ahead.

It's not in my can.

See, we can I could carry resentments over the past, this and the other, but that's death.

You're not living.

You have to acknowledge one thing that we are imperfect.

We're not saints.

We're all sinners and saints or whatever we are. We do the best we can.

we are. We do the best we can.

Life is painful. Sometimes people get hurt. Some we get hurt. But you can't

hurt. Some we get hurt. But you can't live like that. You have to say get over it. Now, if you can't get over it, fine.

it. Now, if you can't get over it, fine.

Good luck to you.

But I have no judgment.

I did what I could.

So that's it.

Would do you hope That's all I want to say.

Do you hope your daughter reads the book?

I'm not going to answer that. No, I

don't care.

I'll move on.

Please. I I want you to cuz I don't want to hurt her.

I understand.

I don't want to I don't want to make any No, 20 years the offer was made, but fine. onwards.

fine. onwards.

In uh towards the end of the book, you talk about a a couple uh labels that uh might apply to you. Uh and one of which is uh Asberers. You I think you say in

there that your wife Stella sort of suspects that you may have Asperers.

Have you ever been diagnosed?

No.

No.

I I'm told I have all the symptoms. I I don't know what any of it means. If I

have it, then I'm happy. I don't know.

But the the other label, it's right in the in in the same paragraph, you know, you say another label that might apply uh is the label cold fish and and you

say uh that you prefer the cold fish label to the Asberers label. Uh why is that? Why does that feel more uh fitting

that? Why does that feel more uh fitting or more comfortable?

Well, it's it's only um it's only a turn of phrase, a cold fish. I'm not a cold fish. I have lots of feelings bundled up

fish. I have lots of feelings bundled up with them. They're deep inside me and

with them. They're deep inside me and when I read something from the past I get tearful. It's not I think what it is

get tearful. It's not I think what it is I don't get attached to sentimentality in this business with actors who admire

and I've worked with I form no attachment.

I respect them, but I form well the coldfish is I am remote.

I am a loner and I've never been able to shake that. Um I have acquaintances,

shake that. Um I have acquaintances, friends if you want to call it that.

I don't have any close friends.

I'm I'm I'm a little distant.

Um a little suspicious, I suppose.

I'm comfortable just chanting along through my my slightly isolated life, but I'm not a recluse. I don't live in a tower. Um

tower. Um I live in a house here and uh I'm traveling a lot. I have my immediate

family, my niece Tara, and um my lovely wife Stella, and they boss me about.

they tell me what to do and I'm happy with that. the the uh sort of personal

with that. the the uh sort of personal remoteness you described. Um I was wondering if if that how that might actually benefit your performances

sometimes because uh when I think of some of your some of my favorite performances that you've given, I'm thinking of things like Remains of the Day or 84 Chering Crossroad

uh The Father, uh even on some level Silence of the Lambs or Shadowlands has this too. there. I feel like there is um

this too. there. I feel like there is um there is sort of an emotional remoteness to some of those characters. Um and I

wonder if that's something that is just sort of like a like a a fingerprint maybe or or a signature of an of a good Anthony Hopkins performance or are is

that an intentional uh sort of performing strategy? Yeah,

performing strategy? Yeah, I think it's partially intentional because many years ago there were two teachers at the Royal Academy. They they

were brief visitors there. They did not appreciate the academy, the academic, but they were teachers of the Stannislavski system, let's say. And I

remember this one teacher called Yat Mangrin.

And um he was a dance teacher.

He's Swedish.

And I used to go to these painful classes of movement. I hated them. And

I'm built like a Welsh rugby scrum, you know, a bit beefy, you know. And the

answer said, you have too much extra extroverted motoric energy. So, and you will become insensitive.

I didn't know what he was talking about.

But I gathered instinctively to develop the other side which was to pull back. be in the darkness, be in the shade called remote.

And it's the remote that paid off for me because I had to change my whole psychology to not be that rambunctious rugby player coming on the stage, bumping into people, being ferocious.

And gradually I learned, no, no, pull back, pull back. There's one acting note that um it was Gloria Graham, the great movie star. She was doing a film with Bogart

star. She was doing a film with Bogart called In a Lonely Place.

Mhm.

And Bogart said her, "Stay in the shade.

Don't go to the camera. Let it come to you." He saw something in her because

you." He saw something in her because she was a little crazy, you know. He

said, "Let it come to you." And I think he had that quality as well.

And that's the more magnetic side.

It compels you to watch. Well, because

you're not doing anything. When Chilton

says to Clarice Stling, "What's he like? You mean Hannibal the Cannibal?"

Cannibal?" And Chilton, the head of the asylum, says, "Oh, he's a monster."

And she goes down the passageway to the cell, maybe expecting to see a blubbering lunatic.

And Jonathan Demi said to me, he said, "How do you want to be seen by Clarice?

Do you want to be lying on the bunk or do you want to be reading?" I said, "No, I want to be standing."

"Why?" I said, "I can smell her coming down the corridor."

When she sees me, there's this still perfectly civil gentleman. Good morning.

You're not real FBI. I hear you. all the

way to the FBI.

That's the way to build a portrait. And

it's all remote because Lecter is the remote spellbinding character.

And if you have remoteness as the centrifugal force in you, that's the driving force that pulls you in.

There's a another epiphany that I'd like to go back to if you don't mind. Uh this

is another one you describe in the book.

It's uh you were driving in Los Angeles in I think the late 70s and you felt a pull to uh go over to a Catholic church and you went inside and

you told a young priest there that you had found God.

Um now I get the sense that you know I don't you're not you know going to church every Sunday or sort of praying in a conventional way. So what is God to

you? Well, it's a it's a it's a touchy

you? Well, it's a it's a it's a touchy subject, isn't it? Because I'm religion and you know, but what happened that morning when that voice said, "It's

over. Now you can start living and it

over. Now you can start living and it has all been from for a purpose.

So don't forget one moment of it." I

knew that was a power way beyond my understanding.

Not up there in the clouds, but here in here.

So I chose to call it at that moment God. I didn't know what else to call it.

God. I didn't know what else to call it.

Short word God. Easy to spell.

And I I recently wrote a piece of music which was conducted in Riyad. Goodbye piano

and orchestra.

And at the end it came to me as I was writing it as I was composing it that that's it.

We come full circle. We dip down to that's all folks and that it was all a dream anyway.

Everything is a dream and it's goodbye before death takes us. I if you're getting nearer to the the big goodbye,

um do you take any pride or draw any meaning or take any solace from what you leave behind both

as a person and as an as an artist?

Oh, you mean a heritage?

A legacy.

A legacy. I never think about it.

I never think about it.

when they cover the earth over you.

Um, that's it. We move on. I remember going

that's it. We move on. I remember going to I was asked by the widow of Lawrence Liv Jun Plaret if I would read the last

lines of King Lea at the casket in this little church in Sussex. I was astounded that I was asked to do it. There was

Olivia's casket full of the flowers and wreaths and collections of flowers from Shakespeare's Winter's Tale.

And after that, we got into our cars and went to um the crerematorium. And I was sitting next to Maggie Smith, the great actress Maggie Smith. I didn't know her

that but we were sitting next to each other and we both worked with Olivia and there was the casket and finally there was the curtain.

You could hear the rollers taking them into the crematorium into the flames.

Maggie Smith said, "What a final curtain."

curtain." And you think, "God almighty, what is it all about?" The wonder of all that

all about?" The wonder of all that energy that had gone into his life or anyone's life, not just a celebrity, but anyone's life. The energy that goes into

anyone's life. The energy that goes into survival.

Seeing my own father dying, you know, going to the hospital the night he died. And standing at the foot of his bed, my mother

smoothing his hair. And I felt his feet at the foot of bed. They were dead cold.

He'd gone. And as I stood there that silent night in that empty or empty sounding hospital

in South Wales, a voice again came to me. You're not so hot either.

This is what'll happen to you. And it's

a great wakeup call when you know that.

It's a fairly brusk voice.

You're not so hot.

But what it is, it's an awakening.

Several awakenings and epiphanies. We

think, "Yeah, that's right.

But sir, sir Anthony, I realize I'm dancing around a question that I would like your answer to. Do you think your life has had meaning?

The only meaning I can put to it is that everything I sought and yearned for found me. I didn't find

it. It came to me.

it. It came to me.

On the interview, we try to talk to our guest twice. So, I spoke with Anthony

guest twice. So, I spoke with Anthony Hopkins a few days later. This time

without video.

Hi, Tony.

Hello. Is that David?

It is David. How are you?

Good.

Good. So, I of course saw that at the end of your book there's an appendix that includes a handful of poems, which is something I'd never seen done in an autobiography before. Can you tell me

autobiography before. Can you tell me why you decided to include those poems?

When I was a kid, I learned a lot of poems, a lot of words, and I was very moved by them from, I think, from about the age of 11.

There was one occasion I was in school. Um,

I was sitting in the back of a classroom where I always sat sullenly, not wanting to be involved in anything.

And uh the English teacher called me. He said, "I want come up here

called me. He said, "I want come up here to the front of the class." I thought, "Oh," he said, "I want you to read this poem." He seemed to have an instinct

poem." He seemed to have an instinct about me that I knew something. And he

handed me a poem uh which was um Westwind by John Macefield.

Mhm. I said, "Read that." He out loud. I

read it and I was strangely moved by it.

And at the end he said, um, that's it.

Okay, good. Thank you. That's very good.

Silver is my first good review, I think.

And I think that's what it is. It's an

expression of my life. I read poems and I get kind of Yeah, I get moved by them.

And I don't know why. I think it's to do with my age and how poetry digs really deep inside us, you know, beyond our understanding.

Would you be willing to read The West Wind by John Macefield? That that is one of the poems that you included in the appendex.

Let me just find that. Can I have I got a minute?

Yep.

Hold on a second.

Well yes.

It's a warm wind, the west wind, full of birds cries.

I never hear the west wind, but tears are in my eyes.

For it comes from the westlands, the old brown hills and Aprils in the west wind and daffodils.

It's a fine land, the Westland, for hearts as tired as mine. Apple orchards

blossom there, the airs like wine. There

is cool green grass there where men may lie at rest and the thrushes are in song there floating in the nest.

Will you not come home brother? You have

been long away. It's April and blossom time and white is the May and bright is the sun, brother and warm is the rain.

Will you not come home, brother? Home to

us again.

The young corn is green brother where the rabbits run. Its blue sky and white clouds and warm rain and sun. Its song

to a man's soul brother fire to man's brain to hear the wild bees and see the merry spring again. Larks are singing in

the west brother above the green wheat.

So will you not come home, brother, and rest your tired feet?

I have a bomb for bruised hearts, brother. Sleep for aching eyes, says the

brother. Sleep for aching eyes, says the warm wind, the west wind full of birds cries.

It's the white road westward is the road I must tread. To the green grass, the cool grass, the rest of heart and head.

To the violets and the warm hearts and the thrushes song in the fine land, the west land, the land where I belong.

I'd like to end on that eloquent grace note. Sir Anthony Hopkins, thank you

note. Sir Anthony Hopkins, thank you very much.

Thank you.

I'm Lulu Garcia Navaro.

And I'm David Maresy.

And we're the hosts of the interview, an audio and video podcast from the New York Times.

Every week we interview fascinating and influential people from all walks of life.

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