Below is a compiled list of the most interesting facts about Anthony Hopkins. Check it out!
Anthony Hopkins was born on December 31, 1937, in Margam, Wales, to Muriel Anne (Yeats) and Richard Arthur Hopkins, a baker. His parents were both of half Welsh and half English descent. Influenced by Richard Burton, he decided to study at College of Music and Drama and graduated in 1957. In 1965, he moved to London and joined the National Theatre, invited by Laurence Olivier, who could see the talent in Hopkins. In 1967, he made his first film for television, A Flea in Her Ear (1967).
Interesting Facts about Anthony Hopkins
- He was awarded the Knight Bachelor of the Order of the British Empire in the 1992 New Year Honours List for his services to drama.
- Served in the British National Service as a Royal Artillery man and for a while was only known as “Gunner Hopkins”.
- His father was a baker.
- Has played a (future) king of England (Richard Lionheart in The Lion in Winter (1968)) and two U.S. Presidents. Interestingly, President Richard Nixon and his brothers were all named after British kings, so it’s likely that he played Nixon’s namesake.
- 9/20/05: On The Oprah Winfrey Show (1986), he said that he is most proud of The Silence of the Lambs (1991), The Remains of the Day (1993) and Proof (2005).
- Pledged $1.6 million to help preserve 4,000 acres of Mt. Snowdon, Wales’ highest peak.
- Often compared with fellow Welshman Richard Burton.
- Ex-son-in-law of Eric Barker and Pearl Hackney.
- An accomplished painter, he has allowed some of his landscape paintings to be exhibited in San Antonio, Texas.
- Graduated from The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, London, England.
- As of 2019, Hopkins has accumulated 436K followers on Twitter and 1.3M on Instagram.
- He has two roles in common with Frank Langella, who is only one day his junior: (1) Langella played Don Diego de la Vega / Zorro in The Mark of Zorro (1974) while Hopkins played him in The Mask of Zorro (1998) and (2) Hopkins played U.S. President Richard Nixon in Nixon (1995) while Langella played him in Frost/Nixon (2008). Both actors also appeared in adaptations of Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel “Dracula”: Langella played the title character in Dracula (1979) while Hopkins played his arch-enemy Professor Abraham Van Helsing in Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992).
Personal Quotes by Anthony Hopkins
I would like to go back to Wales. I’m obsessed with my childhood and at least three times a week dream I am back there.
Anthony Hopkins
My philosophy is it’s none of my business what people say of me and think of me. I am what I am, and I do what I do. I expect nothing and accept everything. And it makes life so much easier.
Anthony Hopkins
Once you begin to fall off the track and believe you breathe different air to everyone else, you’re doomed; you’re finished.
Anthony Hopkins
I think a certain amount of stress in life is good. The stress of just working, which takes effort – I think it keeps you going.
Anthony Hopkins
I’m interested in the dream and subconscious mind, the peculiar dream-like quality of our lives, sometime nightmare quality of our lives.
Anthony Hopkins
