Anthony Hopkins names his favourite kind of director: “It’s really a question of trust”
Sir Anthony Hopkins has worked with some of the greatest directors of all time, both on stage and on the silver screen. Most people will immediately associate him with Jonathan Demme, as both men defined their careers with The Silence of the Lambs. That’s not all, though. Hopkins has also teamed up with Francis Ford Coppola (Bram Stoker’s Dracula), Ridley Scott (Hannibal), Stephen Spielberg (Amistad), and many, many more.
That being said, when you’ve been around the movie business as long as Hopkins has, you can’t avoid working with a few turkeys. The Welsh icon somehow ended up involved in Zack Snyder’s horrendous ‘Rebel Moon’ series, voicing a robot with all the enthusiasm of a schoolkid doing their French speaking exam. In his own words, he’s not a massive fan of Tony Richardson, who he once called “a fake”.
Over his long and successful stint as an actor, Hopkins has had plenty of time to discover what he does and doesn’t like about a director. In an interview with NPR, he outlined the one trait that he looks for in a boss. “It’s not that they exactly leave you alone, but what they do, they let you develop the character,” he explained. “It’s really a question of trust. And what I felt with Jonathan [Demme] was that he had total trust in me as an actor. And because he paid me that compliment, I had total trust in him as a director. He would listen to some of my suggestions that I wanted to do. And, you know, he – there were two ideas I came up with that he thought were excellent, and he let me get on with them.”
He then went on to describe how Demme gave him considerable input in the presentation of Thomas Harris’ famous serial killer. For the scene where Dr Lecter is first introduced, Hopkins recalled a regular nightmare he had as a child, where somebody was waiting for him at the top of the stairs. He translated this into Hannibal waiting for Clarice Starling (Jodie Foster) in the middle of his cell, as if he were expecting her. Demme was allegedly completely freaked out by this idea, so into the film it went.
It goes without saying that the legend’s input was well received. Lecter is one of the most famous movie characters of all time, winning Hopkins his first of two ‘Best Actor’ Oscars. So many of the infamous prisoner’s idiosyncrasies are now baked into popular culture, from his line delivery to the strange noises he makes in between sentences. None of these would have materialised had Demme taken a stricter approach to directing.
In a separate conversation, Hopkins named On the Waterfront and East of Eden director Elia Kazan as the ‘greatest’ filmmaker of all time. The two never worked together, but the star would have undoubtedly heard of his reputation as an ‘actor’s director’. Kazan always let his performers lead the way, working closely with them to bring their visions of characters to life. This is how he managed to get the best out of the likes of Marlon Brando and James Dean, by feeding their considerable egos.
Sometimes, it’s best to take a step back and let a great actor do what they do best. Hopkins is living proof of that; when he’s motivated, there’s no one else like him, but when he feels creatively stifled, that’s when you get Rebel Moon
