He’s one of the world’s most successful and renowned film stars with a £100 million fortune, a glamorous Hollywood lifestyle and two ‘Best Actor’ Oscars among his many accolades.
But there’s one accomplishment that has eluded Sir Anthony Hopkins: re-establishing a relationship with his only child, from whom he has been estranged for almost 25 years.
The Silence of the Lambs star has admitted this week that he is haunted by his failure as father towards his daughter Abigail, who has resisted his attempts at reconciliation.
Abigail has never forgiven Sir Anthony for abandoning her when she was barely a toddler – as his disastrous marriage to her mother broke down.
Now the Daily Mail can reveal that Abigail’s decision to ignore the olive branch that her father has recently extended may be down to a devastating health ordeal she has been through – without any support from Sir Anthony.
Abigail’s life changed irrevocably when she was diagnosed with stage three bowel cancer.
The 57-year-old found herself plunged into a gruelling round of treatments, undergoing radiotherapy and low anterior resection surgery as well as a 12-week course of chemotherapy.
She documented her cancer journey in a series of unflinchingly intimate posts on her Instagram – including selfies taken in hospital gowns and masks in which she is visibly poorly at various stages of this physically and mentally sapping process.
Abigail Hopkins was diagnosed with stage three bowel cancer and documented her journey in a series of unflinchingly intimate posts on her Instagram
The 57-year-old posted pictures of herself undergoing gruelling round of cancer treatment, where she looked visibly poorly at various stages
Abigail has never forgiven Sir Anthony for abandoning her when she was barely a toddler, although he helped her land acting roles in several high profile films he was also appearing in
Throughout that draining experience she did not see her father once – he was 8,000 miles away in California.
Finally, in June 2022, a full 18 months after that diagnosis, she went into remission.
Writing on her personal website after being told that good news, Abigail hailed those who helped save her and said: ‘I owe my life to my medical team, to the NHS, my loved ones and friends who supported me. Without them all I would not be here to share my story with you!’
It may not have been intended but with hindsight this phrasing must be hard reading for her father – who wasn’t among that supporting group.
Sir Anthony and Abigail have now been estranged since the early 2000s – a fact which was dragged back into the public domain by Sir Anthony this week when he published and promoted a new memoir in which he reflects on their estrangement and its causes.
In that book, ‘We Did Ok, Kid’, 87-year-old Sir Anthony concedes that he does not blame Abigail for the enduring ill-feeling between them and insists that ‘my door is always open’ for a reconciliation.
Before her diagnosis Abigail had been an actress – and also done acting coaching work – but had struggled to achieve anything like even a fraction of the success of her father.
She had, with his help, landed some small roles in quite high profile films that he was also appearing in, including in 1993 alone, both Shadowlands and Remains of the Day.
Her father, who would receive a Best Actor Oscar nomination for the latter, later wrote of this period: ‘I helped her get small acting parts and I tried to make her feel as welcome as I could.’
But the experience of fighting and beating cancer seems to have had a transformative effect on Abigail – giving her new focus and energy.
She moved to the seaside, to St Leonards in Sussex, the twin town of the more famous Hastings which is a magnet for bohemian artistic types on a budget.
Now Abigail, who is not believed to be in a relationship, lives in a £300,000 three bed Victorian terraced house, close to a pizza takeaway and barber shop.
She shelved acting and instead studied for an MA in Film Making – forcibly taking an eight month study break during treatments before resuming her studies and graduating in 2023 with a distinction.
Soon after she produced an intimate short documentary charting her experience battling cancer called Under This Sky – and the film went on to win a clutch of awards including Best Documentary at the London Indie Film Festival.
She also wrote songs for a charity album called Stardust with the proceeds from downloads and streams going to a charity associated with the hospital that had successfully treated her, The Royal Marsden.
Abigail declined to discuss her relationship with her father when the Daily Mail called round to her Sussex home.
But then Abigail has rarely spoken publicly about her broken family life – and has not done publicly for almost 20 years.
The last time she did address their relationship, she told The Telegraph in 2006: ‘We have never really been close. We’ve never discussed big life issues. Because, well, our relationship was always so sporadic.
Abigail has studied for an MA in Film Making – forcibly taking an eight month study break during treatments before resuming her studies and graduating in 2023 with a distinction
Sir Anthony married Abigail’s mother Petronella Baker (pictured) in 1967 but they separated 18 months later before formally divorcing in 1972
‘I’ve never felt I could discuss those sort of things with him.’
And her father has said: ‘Abigail never seemed able to forgive me for leaving the family when she was a baby. She had her reasons. I can’t blame her for that. That’s life. But it was and is a tremendous source of pain.’
Abigail is three-times-married Sir Anthony’s only child. Although she still uses his name professionally it’s thought that she now goes by another surname in her private life, one associated with her mother’s family.
That mother was Petronella Barker, Sir Anthony’s first wife.
They had married in 1967, Abigail was born in 1968 but they separated 18 months later and formally divorced in 1972.
The marriage had been a ‘disaster’, Sir Anthony writes in the memoir, revealing how he and Petronella, who is now aged 83, had fought frequently and bitterly.
So bitterly that Port Talbot-born actor abruptly left his wife – and their toddler daughter – following one particularly volatile argument.
This came after he had returned to their London home following filming in Scotland at a time when he was in the grip of alcoholism
Recalling the moment he went in to see Abigail, then just 14-months old in her nursery before walking out the door for good, he writes: ‘I looked down at her and whispered goodbye.Then I walked back to the hall, picked up my suitcases, and left the house.’
And although it’s understood he continued to provide financial support, he subsequently did not have contact with Abigail for the key years of her early childhood.
He writes: ‘It is the saddest fact of my life, and my greatest regret, and yet I feel absolutely sure that it would have been much worse for everyone if I’d stayed.’
Sir Anthony said that he later tried to make amends when Abigail was nine, but the interaction was awkward.
Another later attempt at a reunion fell flat, he says, because his daughter was distant.
Their relationship continued to be sporadic and unsatisfactory as Abigail entered her teens and her own problems came to the fore.
At 18 she developed an addiction to amphetamines and alcohol which saw her drop out of her place at the University of East Anglia where she was studying English.
She said of this period in that same 2006 Telegraph interview: ‘I came very close to killing myself. It was the worst time I can remember. I totally abused my mind and body.’
And she was unequivocal about who was to blame.
‘The root cause was the fact that my father and I had an intermittent relationship when I was young,’ she said. ‘I was angry and there was a lot of grieving going on.’
They managed to get onto a better footing during that period when Hopkins supported her burgeoning acting career – and he also bought her a flat – but their always tenuous contact collapsed completely in the early 2000s and has never resumed.
A nadir came in 2018 when he was being interviewed by the Radio Times and he was asked about ever becoming a grandfather.
Sir Anthony responded: ‘I don’t have any idea. People break up. Families split and, you know, ‘Get on with your life.’ People make choices. I don’t care one way or the other.’
Writing about this callous remark now, in his new book, the actor now says he has ‘no excuse’ for having made those comments.
He says he believes it was ‘the coldness of my grandfather coming out’ adding: ‘I hope my daughter knows that my door is always open to her. I want her to be well and happy.
‘I will always be sorry for hurting her when I left the family, even as I believe to this day that I had no choice.’
However, his attempts at one final reconciliation have so far gone unanswered.
In an interview to promote the book, he told the New York Times: ‘My wife, Stella, sent an invitation to come and see us.
‘Not a word of response. So I think, OK, 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, fine, go ahead. It’s not in my ken. I could carry resentment over the past, 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.’
The four-time BAFTA winner and his 67-year-old third wife, Stella Arroyave, live in the up-scale neighbourhood of Brentwood, California.
With her renewed professional appetite it’s unclear whether Abigail will ever take up her father’s offer of reconciliation remains to be seen, but it would be a change from St Leonard’s to accept that offer from the stepmother she doesn’t know to visit them in the U.S.
The four-time BAFTA winner and his 67-year-old third wife, Stella Arroyave, live in the up-scale neighbourhood of Brentwood, in the shadow of the Santa Monica Mountains, with views over the Pacific.
He is renting the luxury home after his Malibu mansion burnt down during the devastating California wildfires in January and is thought to be deciding whether to rebuild.
For most people losing a home in such a shocking way would be uniquely traumatising – but Sir Anthony is already used to great loss.
It remains to be seen if he will ever rebuild his relationship with Abigail.