Innate inside Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, William Powell was an only baby & showed an early aptitude for performing. Fallowing senior high, he left personal for Future York & a American Academy of Dramatic Arts at the age of 18. Inside 1912 Powell graduated from either a AADA, & so he worked around occasionally music hall and futures corporations. Fallowing the successful personal experience as a brilliant actor on the Broadway stage, in 1922 he began a Hollywood career. His number 1 starring role wwhen as Philo Vance in 1929's The Canary Murder Case. He followed this higher using a Vance role in The Kennel Murder Case in 1933. In a equivalent season, he was divorced from either his 2nd married woman, the actress Carole Lombard, who in the future went in to marry Clark Gable, but using whom he remained around first-class terms, potentially co-starring sustaining her in the picture show many years fallowing their divorcement.

Powell's best known role was that of "Nick Charles" within sextet "Thin Man" films, beginning using The Thin Man in 1934, considered by many a right of the bunch, where he proved his sophisticated charme & his witty sense of humor. A delicious Myrna Loy played his wife "Nora Charles" around every of the "Thin Man" films, & his partnership by having Loy would turn into a screen's virtually all prolific ever, sustaining a few appearing around Fourteen films together.

He received an Academy Award Nomination for The Thin Man, and starred in the Right Picture of 1936, The Great Ziegfeld, in 1936, where Ziegfeld's character wwhen somewhat sanitized, and which likewise starred Loy as Billie Burke, Ziegfeld's wife. Powell may play any role by having authority whether it was comedy, thriller or even drama. He would receive his 2nd Academy Award Nomination for the magnificent comedy My Man Godfrey (1936), with Carole Lombard. He get on top of the globe until 1937.

Within 1935 he starred with Jean Harlow in Reckless, and it be super close friends. Soon Powell's friendly relationship using Harlow developed into the good romance. Sadly she died prior to it may marry, apparently of azotemic poisoning (however the bit of sources claimed it was a bungled illegal abortion that ended her life). His distress on top Harlow's dying & the battle by having cancer, which he ultimately beat, resulted within his accepting fewer roles. In January 6, 1940, he married the beautiful actress, Diana Lewis. Although a few experienced lone met first triad weeks prior to their marriage, it remained married until Powell's demise inside 1984.

His career slowed substantially around the late 1940s, although in 1947 he received his third Academy Award nomination for his work inside Life with Father. His go film was Mister Roberts in 1955. Despite many appeal to go to to the screen, Powell refused everthing offers, happy inside his retirement.

Powell died of natural drives around Palm Springs, California at the age of 91, a select few xxx years fallowing his retirement, survived by his married woman, Diana.

Quotes
The Thin Man, 1934
The Thin Man, 1934
The Thin Man, 1934
After The Thin Man, 1936
Life with Father, 1947
My Man Godfrey, 1936
Academy Awards Nominations
1948 Nominated Best Actor in a Leading Role - Life with Father 1937 Nominated Best Actor in a Leading Role - My Man Godfrey 1935 Nominated Best Actor in a Leading Role - The Thin Man

He has the star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1636 Vine Street.

Filmography
Sherlock Holmes (1922) When Knighthood Was in Flower (1922) Outcast (1922) The Bright Shawl (1923) Under the Red Robe (1923) Dangerous Money (1924) Romola (1924) Too Many Kisses (1925) Faint Perfume (1925) ''My Lady's Lips (1925) The Beautiful City (1925) White Mice (1926) Sea Horses (1926) Desert Gold (1926) The Runaway (1926) Aloma of the South Seas (1926) Beau Geste (1926) Tin Gods (1926) The Great Gatsby (1926) New York (1927) Love's Greatest Mistake (1927) Senorita (1927) Special Delivery (1927) Time to Love (1927) Paid to Love (1927) Nevada (1927) She's a Sheik (1927) Beau Sabreur (1928) The Last Command (1928) Feel My Pulse (1928) Partners in Crime (1928) The Dragnet (1928) The Vanishing Pioneer (1928) Forgotten Faces (1928) Interference (1928) The Canary Murder Case (1929) The Four Feathers (1929) The Greene Murder Case (1929) Charming Sinners (1929) Pointed Heels (1929) Behind the Make-Up (1930) Street of Chance (1930) The Benson Murder Case (1930) Paramount on Parade (1930) Shadow of the Law (1930) For the Defense (1930) Man of the World (1931) Ladies' Man (1931) The Road to Singapore (1931) High Pressure (1932) Jewel Robbery (1932) Screen Snapshots (1932) (short subject) One Way Passage (1932) Lawyer Man (1933) Private Detective 62 (1933) Double Harness (1933) The Kennel Murder Case (1933) Fashions of 1934 (1934) Manhattan Melodrama (1934) The Thin Man (1934) The Key (1934) Evelyn Prentice (1934) Star of Midnight (1935) Reckless (1935) Escapade (1935) Rendezvous (1935) The Great Ziegfeld (1936) The Ex-Mrs. Bradford (1936) My Man Godfrey (1936) Libeled Lady (1936) After the Thin Man (1936) The Last Mrs. Cheney (1937) The Emperor's Candlesticks (1937) Double Wedding (1937) The Baroness and the Butler (1938) Another Thin Man (1939) I Love You Again (1940) Love Crazy (1941) Shadow of the Thin Man (1941) Crossroads (1942) The Youngest Profession (1943) (Cameo) The Heavenly Body (1943) The Thin Man Goes Home (1945) The Great Morgan (1946) (voice only) Ziegfeld Follies (1946) The Hoodlum Saint (1946) Screen Snapshots: The Skolsky Party (1946) (short subject) Life With Father (1947) Song of the Thin Man (1947) The Senator Was Indiscreet (1947) Mr. Peabody and the Mermaid (1948) Take One False Step (1949) Dancing in the Dark (1949) It's a Big Country (1951) The Treasure of Lost Canyon (1952) The Girl Who Had Everything (1953) How to Marry a Millionaire (1953) Mister Roberts (1955) Distant Jamaica'' (1969) (short subject)

Trivia
A late Don Adams stated in interviews that his far-famed "clippy" voice characterization was according to, & an exaggeration of, a speaking style of William Powell.