The original joining of these two old men seems to have been entirely sexual, though it has grown into something more substantial. In life and literature, the broken family is ubiquitous, and the God-given penis-slavery of the human male that has demolished so many of them is seldom blamed. Character Jacob may nurture blame, but playwright Siegel does not. Though gay characters are de rigueur these days, this particular homosexual union is more than trendy. It truly informs the conflict.

Though issues abound, the overt one involves a struggle to obtain/retain the one and only good painting by Martin, the irascible elderly father. This father may also have abandoned an important artistic career to support his children financially.

Oddly, in the memory of all these characters, there is a conspicuous absence of the wife. The artist, Martin, makes much of his duty to his children, but his abandoned wife is apparently a cipher, a zero, a nonentity. Siegel seems to have forgotten her too.

But within the confines of the conflict, the playwright does not take sides, though son Jacob, armed with self-serving motives, is mired in a tiresome, one-note litany: “I want the painting!” One may sympathize with an actor whose character needs a little more dimension from the playwright, but this actor, with his discomfort and his right arm forever slicing space, doesn’t help much. In the right hands, Jacob’s duplicity and repressed fury might have played better.

The two elderlies are wonderfully etched by Lawrence Merritt as the attractive, possibly wealthy Nathan and Jeremy Johnson as the artist Martin. Johnson gives clean delivery to the artist’s clever, torturing jabs at his offspring, and the pair create a believable personal world.

Over the years, their relationship has evolved into comfortable, spousy affection, even as their roles have reversed. (In their youth, Nathan appeared dominant. In their old age, the dying Martin rules the upscale roost.) Act One ends sweetly as Nathan eases Martin’s agitation with a Johnny Mathis recording of “Just the Way You Look Tonight.”

Siegel flashes us back to the couple’s youth when the charismatic Nathan is threatening Martin with emotional/sexual withdrawal. Brian Linden as young Nathan brings a very special particularity to this character, and he takes the evening’s Tony.

Even though the play begs for an antique-bedecked, high-ceilinged set, Barbara Waldinger’s direction walks the staged-reading high-wire with sure feet. The sedentary demands of an elderly couple make for not much visual interest in some scenes, but in Act II, they set off the restless, graceful physicality of young Nathan. All of it, of course, is executed with scripts in hand. The nasal-voiced narration from a corner was mercifully minimal.

In this performance the ending did not read well, but I think it can.

Every play that reaches this stage of development has been revised, adjusted, and tweaked to a fare-thee-well. The Legacy is nearly ready for commercial production, and it seems likely that HRC Showcase has moved it along.