Interspecies interactions take a therapeutic turn in “Seascape,” Edward Albee’s problematic but intermittently wrenching Pulitzer Prize-winning curiosity of 1975. Many of Mr. Albee’s preoccupations – the moments when the walls of civility give way to existential terror, the ambivalence of parenthood, the chafings of a long marriage – surface under the unlikely guise of two humans and two talking lizards who explore the rewards and responsibilities of being warm-hearted as well as warm-blooded. And director Mark Lamos’s continued attention toward the trickier corners of Mr. Albee’s canon pays off with this crystalline, hugely satisfying revival.

Two grandparents vacation on a sand dune; Nancy (Frances Sternhagen) works on a watercolor, while Charlie (George Grizzard) dozes over a crossword puzzle. (Michael Yeargan’s set and Peter Kaczorowski’s lighting give the windswept locale an almost palpable late-summer chill.) Nancy wears her restlessness, her agitated fear of death, on her sleeve far more than the seemingly content Charlie. But with a little nudging on her part, we learn that Charlie had a childhood penchant for oblivion that entailed holding two heavy stones and immersing himself in the ocean. The memory of this underwater adolescence spurs him into a deep reverie: “One stops being an intruder, finally – just one more object come to the bottom, or living thing, part of the undulation and the silence.”

As diverting as their bickering is, though, it is quickly trumped by the intruders that come to the top in “Seascape.” Charlie and Nancy’s seaside idyll is interrupted by the arrival of Leslie and Sarah (Frederick Weller and Elizabeth Marvel), two human-size reptiles who force the older couple into revisiting the ramifications of the choices they’ve made and the ones that still await them.

But what are these green beasties – Mr. Albee refers to them in the script interchangeably as “lizards” and “sea creatures” – doing on land in the first place? Mr. Albee addresses this in time; his first priority is charting the effect of their arrival on Charlie and Nancy. He has essentially written a work of science fiction, whereby the tweaking of rules of nature gives us an oblique glimpse at ourselves. This sort of tale frequently takes place through the childlike eyes of some sort of alien naif who forces us to look afresh at deeply ingrained ideas.

Leslie and Sarah (outfitted by Catherine Zuber with resplendent yet flexible costumes) have many of these tentative, probing qualities, but they’re hardly innocents. They may be curious about why Nancy has breasts or how birds can “swim” on the air, but Leslie operates on the assumption that this new world in general and Charlie in particular pose a threat. He may have a point: Much like Nick and Honey, who wander unwittingly into another older married couple’s crossfire in Mr. Albee’s “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” Leslie and Sarah quickly become pawns in the humans’ soul-defining squabbles over everything from whether humans eat parrots to whether they’re still alive.

Unfortunately, science fiction demands a strict adherence to whatever ground rules the fantasist establishes, and this doesn’t seem to be Mr. Albee’s strong suit. A central theme is the idea of Leslie and Sarah learning what it is to have “emotions.” But if pride is one of the emotions presumably unavailable to them, why does Sarah point out that Leslie is very proud of his tail? It seems ridiculous to fault one of America’s pre-eminent playwrights for his failings at spinning a sci-fi yarn. But he’s the one who chose the format, and disbelief is a lot harder to suspend if the author can’t be bothered to play fair with the genre’s conventions.

Which brings us back to the question of what brings the lizards to terra firma. They hem and haw about this a bit, but Sarah finally volunteers that it was spurred by a sort of reptilian restlessness. “We had a sense of not belonging anymore. … All of a sudden, everything … down there … was terribly … interesting, I suppose; but what did it have to do with us anymore?” Charlie is all too familiar with this sort of malaise, and he forces Sarah into a heightened comprehension of emotion by confronting her with the previously unheard-of prospect of loss.

Now, the notion of evolution through tough love is a fairly difficult one to take seriously, although no more so than Sarah’s assertion of evolution through change of scenery. But what the scene sacrifices in scientific plausibility it more than makes up in dramatic force.

Theatergoers should count themselves lucky if they see another dramatic image all year as potent as the sight of Sarah contorted in sobs, with the unmodulated emotions of a child mixed with the deep romantic attachments of an adult. The formidable Ms. Marvel’s conflicted, hopeful Sarah enters her growing pantheon of stellar work, and Mr. Weller complements her well, giving Leslie an enjoyable blend of hauteur and insecurity.

Mr. Lamos is clearly drawn to the tough stuff when it comes to Mr. Albee, tackling the frequently impenetrable “Tiny Alice” in 2000 and now “Seascape.” He shows considerable wisdom in his casting here: the original Charlie and Nancy, Barry Nelson and Deborah Kerr, were a full generation younger in 1975 than Mr. Grizzard and Ms. Sternhagen are now. When Nancy speaks of seeking “all the wisdom – by accident, by accident, some of it – all the wisdom and the … unfettering,” the concept is much richer coming from someone with another 20 years of life to draw upon. Both actors draw upon their ample naturalistic gifts, and Mr. Grizzard (the original Nick in “Virginia Woolf”) confirms his position as our leading male Albee interpreter with his contrary, enveloping take on Charlie.

In fact, Mr. Albee’s sumptuous use of language and predilection for characters in extremis has resulted in a sort of ideal clubhouse for actors of all ages, with wily veterans like Mr. Grizzard and Marian Seldes being joined by vibrant young talents like David Harbour and now Ms. Marvel in giving fresh voice to his work. Mortality weighs heavily on all of Mr. Albee’s plays, “Seascape” more than most. And while this growing roster of acting talent can’t do much about his mortality or anyone else’s, it is undoubtedly a tonic for him to see a production like this and be reminded that his work will continue to harm and comfort and confound and sing.

Until January 8 (222 W. 45th Street, between Broadway and Eighth Avenue, 212-239-6200).