In 1749, he and Sophie visited Moscow, where they married; they left Russia in 1751 and founded the Ackermann troupe (Ackermann'sche Gesellschaft).
The troupe visited Danzig, Königsberg, Breslau, Warsaw, Leipzig, Halle, then Frankfurt and with the beginning of the Seven Years' War via Strasbourg, France, to Switzerland.
After the peace treaty, they returned via Strasbourg, Frankfurt, Mainz, Braunschweig, and Hanover to Hamburg, which became the domicile of the troupe.
In 1767, the troupe was sold to a consortium of private owners, called the Hamburg National Theatre or the Hamburgische Entreprise, also known as Lessing's Dramaturgie, with Abel Seyler as its main backer.
The dramaturgie was home to famous founders of German histrionics such as Friedrich Ludwig Schröder and Konrad Ekhof.