On the right is a 1940 article that recalled William Powell's climb to the top of the Hollywood pantheon:
"When the talking pictures came in, the transition didn't bother him at all. Many of the silent stars turned out to have voices that squeaked like the brakes of a 1914 automobile. Powell had been training his voice ever since the fateful days of high school. His star immediately zoomed. Studios fought for his services and his salary leaped sky-high. Usually, he played the heavy and vaguely this bothered him. He didn't want to be type cast; didn't want to confine his acting to playing suave villains. Finally he went to M-G-M, where he was allowed to have a voice in selecting his own pictures. They handed him a script of The Thin Man."
More about The Thin Man can be read here.
