The Testa family is a well respected immigrant working class family. The patriarch, Tullio Testa, is a modest landscape contractor, anxious to impress his visiting brother from Italy with his success in the New World. Tullio and his brother have not spoken for over twenty years due to a dispute over land inheritance in Italy. To create the appearance of a man of leisure, Tullio turns the business over to his sons, putting Massimo, the younger, educated, favourite son in charge. Joe, who has worked alongside his father in the dirt, is shunned.