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| Geoff Morrell and David James discuss the options. Australia Day - Playhouse |
Coming immediately after the more sombre remembrance of Anzac Day, Jonathan Biggins’ Australia Day — a Melbourne Theatre Company/Sydney Theatre Company co-production — challenges audiences to consider what in fact, beyond our soldiers, it is that brings us all together.
We are thrown into the Coriole Shire’s committee meeting for the country town’s upcoming January 26th celebration. Here we find a humorous, flawed but largely likeable microcosm of Australian society: the ambitious Liberal Mayor and hardware store owner Brian (Geoff Morrell), loyal deputy Robert (David James), CWA community champion Marie (Valerie Bader) and crude, Green-hating builder Wally (Peter Kowitz).
Telegraphed if nothing else by their late arrival to the meeting, the outsiders to this established local network are Greens’ councillor Helen (Allison Whyte), an inner-city Melburnian who has in fact lived in the area for two years, and Chester (Kaeng Chan), a smart-alec Australian-born Vietnamese school teacher who quickly shows he can give as good as he gets.
As the initial gossiping is followed by the serious issues of the meeting — what varieties of sausages should be bought, whether a dreamtime story should be acted out by the wholly-white schoolchildren, etc — we come to understand each of the characters’ ideologies. Opinions, be they progressive, conservative and often pragmatic, flow easily and often with an obscene tongue to assure us of how deeply-held they are.
Morrell slips easily back into his role as Australia’s favourite conflicted mayor, reviving memories of his time as Mayor Dunkley in the ABC’s local council series Grass Roots. With more pragmatism than principle, he tries to keep Wally and Helen from (figuratively) tearing each other apart, while working out a way to protect his business from the hardware giant hoping to move into the area (“they’re not competition, they’re napalm”).
The flame-haired Whyte is perfectly cast as the modern councillor trying to bring a new way of thinking to the happily traditional town. Calm and collected, the frustrations of being a minority representative together with a single mother gradually come to show.
Bader and Kowitz’s characters represent the older-end of the community, disinterested in technology and politically incorrect. Kowitz however plays the angry, bewildered role, while Bader cheerfully fills the stage as the lamington-making grandmother, retaining her quick wit. Both mock the cocky school teacher played by Chan, who proves to be the most visibly patriotic of all.
With excellent pacing and constant laughs, Australia Day provides the audience, often through private conversations, the chance to go behind the stereotypes of each character as the big day arrives, showing us what truly motivates them and the dangers of judging a book (or bearded local) by its cover.
While one key source of drama can be seen well in advance, the David Cottrell-directed play is focused on the characters, not suspense, resulting in a sometimes disturbingly realistic picture of Australian society.
Extremely relevant (no major federal politician escapes attack), honest and clever (look for the Greens’ councillor’s plan to turn the political demographic upside-down), Australia Day pokes fun at cultural traditions while asking whether the consequences of change are any better.
by Matthew Raggatt
Published on Crikey's Curtain Call on 3 May 2012. Access at: http://blogs.crikey.com.au/curtaincall/2012/05/03/review-australia-day-playhouse-melbourne/
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