AUSTRALIA DayHit ProductionsTheatre Royal IT'S a tight competition -between Jonathan Biggins, Max Gillies and John Clarke for the title of Australia's leading political satirist. 
However, with Australia Day playwright/director -Biggins emerges the clear -winner.
He has a formidable knowl-edge of national politics, plus the understanding to make complex issues accessible through user-friendly -examples.
Add striking metaphors, an ability to project himself into the shoes and minds of others, and - perhaps most importantly - an abundant and genuine love for Australia and Australians, even at our most infuriatingly self-deluding.
Plus he's a dab hand at laugh-out-loud comedy.
Australia Day confidently tackles economics, nationalism, history, culture, class, race, our treatment of minorities, and so much more.
There are many greater and lesser messages, though in an age which champions change above all else, perhaps none is more necessary than the simple statement: "Progress is when things get better." Less glossy than the STC premiere a few years back, this touring production hits all the right acting notes with six -detailed, generous perform-ances by six top-drawer actors.
Under Biggins's superb -direction, they play for truth, not humour. This, of course, is exactly why it works so well, and is so funny. Biggins's revisions to the text are timely - indeed, if he spruced it up every five years or so, Australia Day could be a staple of the national repertoire for decades to come.- ROBERT JARMAN