William H. Powell

William Horatio Powell was an American actor born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on July 29, 1892, the only child of Nettie Manila Powell and Horatio Warren Powell, an accountant. In 1907, the family relocated to Kansas City, Missouri, where Powell completed his secondary education at Central High School. Following graduation, he briefly enrolled at the University of Kansas to pursue law before leaving after a week to move to New York City, where he trained at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. He departed the AADA in 1912 and spent the following years working in vaudeville and stock companies before establishing himself on Broadway.

Powell's Broadway career spanned 1917 to 1922 and included appearances in The Woman Who Laughed, Bavu, Spanish Love, and Exit the King. In 1922, he transitioned to Hollywood, appearing in a production of Sherlock Holmes alongside John Barrymore and later portraying Francis I in When Knighthood Was in Flower with Marion Davies. He spent the remainder of the 1920s under contract to Paramount Pictures before moving to Warner Bros. Among his silent film roles was a vengeful film director in The Last Command in 1928. His first starring role came the following year, when he played detective Philo Vance in The Canary Murder Case, a character he would portray four times at Paramount. The vocal training Powell had developed through his stage work proved a significant advantage as the industry shifted to sound pictures.

At Warner Bros., Powell starred opposite Kay Francis in seven pre-Code films beginning with Street of Chance in 1930, including Jewel Robbery in 1932, in which his character offers marijuana cigarettes to his victims. His career reached a new level of prominence after he signed with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, where he was paired with Myrna Loy in fourteen films. The most celebrated of these was The Thin Man in 1934, the first of six films in which Powell played Nick Charles, a character drawn from Dashiell Hammett's novel about Nick and Nora Charles. The role earned Powell his first Academy Award nomination for Best Actor in 1935. He received his second nomination for the 1936 comedy My Man Godfrey, and his third for his portrayal of Clarence Day Sr. in Life with Father in 1947. That same year, he received the New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actor for Life with Father and The Senator Was Indiscreet. Powell also appeared in The Great Ziegfeld in 1936, again opposite Loy. His final film role was playing Doc in Mister Roberts in 1955.

Powell's personal life included three marriages. On April 15, 1915, he married Eileen Wilson, born Julia Mary Tierney, with whom he had a son, William David Powell, who later became a television writer and producer before his death by suicide in 1968. Powell and Wilson divorced in 1930. On June 26, 1931, he married actress Carole Lombard; the two divorced in 1933 but later appeared together in My Man Godfrey. Powell was deeply affected by Lombard's death in an airplane crash in 1942. He was also romantically involved with actress Jean Harlow, his co-star in Reckless in 1935 and Libeled Lady in 1936. Harlow died in June 1937 at age 26 from uremia caused by undiagnosed kidney failure. On January 6, 1940, three weeks after meeting actress Diana Lewis, Powell married her; she retired from her film career, and the two remained married until his death. In March 1938, Powell was diagnosed with rectal cancer and underwent surgery and experimental radium treatment, achieving full remission within two years. During this period, combined with his grief over Harlow's death, he did not take on any film roles for more than a year.

Powell held a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1636 Vine Street, and in 1992 a Golden Palm Star on the Palm Springs Walk of Stars was dedicated to him. He died on March 5, 1984, in Palm Springs, California, from pneumonia at the age of 91, and is buried at Desert Memorial Park in Cathedral City, California.