With trouble flaring at Campsfield detention centre in Kidlington this month, there could hardly have been a better time for Big Brother Behind Bars, one of three short dramas at the Pegasus on Tuesday.

The concept was ambitious - fusing a critique not only of the treatment of asylum seekers, but also of 'reality' television in an bid to explore why some people choose voluntary incarceration when so many others are driven to breaking point by imprisonment.

A group of telly narcissists agreed to be banged up in Campsfield while on the other side of a heavy door, detainees manhandled by brutish guards cried out for help.

The piece was performed enthusiastically by Oxford Youth Theatre's 14-19 group on the Orwellian set, but unfortunately, the work was preachy and simplistic. Principally it was a homage to the social scientist Stanley Milgram, featuring a re-imagining of two of his best-known experiments, studying the way subjects become immersed in assigned identities, and people's willingness to follow orders barked by boffins in white coats.

The theme of being forgotten was tackled by OYT in Partial Recall, which featured lost souls trapped in limbo, overseen by invisible analysts.

This was often balletic, with the characters drifting in and out of slumber, responding to throbbing dance music, snatches of conversation and everyday objects. The murky, ethereal backdrop perhaps represented clouds, yet seemed to hint at the electrifying realm of a brain's neural network. The intriguing drama finished just as it was starting to piece together the mystery, and left me wanting more.

Platypus Theatre pushed the boundaries with The Tale of Mary Blandy, the third drama.

Each of the three segments on Tuesday were meant to be 35 minutes long, but the adult group took an hour to re-enact the story of the Henley woman hanged in 1752 for poisoning her father. But it was entertaining enough.