The German expatriate stage director Erwin Piscator began a long association with the school in 1940.
Among the faculty were Lee Strasberg and Stella Adler, among the students Robert De Niro, Marlon Brando, Tony Curtis, Beatrice Arthur, Walter Matthau, Tennessee Williams and Elaine Stritch.
With Erwin Piscator's return to West-Germany in October 1951 his wife Maria Ley-Piscator took over the school's management.
In later years, Ley-Piscator sold the school to the film and theatre agent Saul C. Colin[4] who sustained the “Senior Dramatic Workshop” until his early death in 1967.
Among the students of the Dramatic Workshop were Frank Aletter, Bea Arthur, Harry Belafonte, Vinnette Justine Carroll, Nehemiah Persoff, Norma (Toni) Sherman, Alicia Bibiloni, Woodrow Parfrey, Gene Saks, Harry Guardino, Marlon Brando, Tony Curtis, Jack Garfein, Walter Matthau, Judith Malina, Deirdre O'Connell, Rod Steiger, Elaine Stritch, Jack Creley, and Tennessee Williams.