For decades, in one small room on West Forty-fourth Street in Manhattan, Lee Strasberg ran the Actors Studio, where dozens of acclaimed actors absorbed a technique that became known as the "Method.

" Based on firsthand observations and numerous interviews, Hirsch's examination of the Studio's origins reveals how its graduates forever shaped the American stage and screen.

A new introduction by the author studies the Actors Studio in the twenty-first century and places it in a modern context.