Even the Lord Chamberlain wouldn’t have minded a bit of haze, surely? Yet a sign on Tuesday’s opening night listed it, with violence and nudity, as one of the features that made this Oxford Brookes Drama Society production an affair aimed at over-16s.

The controversial haze turned out to be dry ice that drifted across the stage while a couple of the young men enjoyed an amorous moment, as if to mask the disturbing embrace. But, despite the audibly lip-smacking encounter, nobody seemed bothered. Clearly much has changed since 1891, when Frank Wedekind penned this once taboo-shattering tale (not performed until 1906, while the powers that be fretted over its content) of adolescent sexual frustration among a group of 14-year-olds misunderstood by each other and their elders – with fatal results.

The protagonists are naïve Wendla (a bubbly Lucie Cox, above), who muses about where babies come from; the diffident, philosophical Moritz (a slightly hesitant Scott Newman), plagued by ‘masculine stirrings’, and worldly-wise Melchior (a confident Will Hatcher, above), dreamy and fearless.

Francis J. Ziegler’s translation does little to disguise the fact that Wedekind’s play is often a pretentious rant, which has lost its bloom of youth.

When one character, Hans (Tom Laws-Campbell) masturbates with the aid of a saucy image, sniggers could be heard rather than gasps of astonishment. Director Charlie Parker – whose programme notes emphasise the ‘shock’ factor – must have been dismayed.

However, the brief and nasty sex scene that closes act one, when Wendla becomes easy prey for Melchior, did provoke some sharp intakes of breath, and Melchior’s earlier rough treatment of Wendla appears harsher here than in last summer’s OUDS production at the Playhouse. (Quite why Brookes has chosen to revive Wedekind’s tragedy remains a mystery.) It is also sexier. Would a female director have ensured two of the cast spent most of the time in their undies and stockings, I wonder?

Spring Awakening is at the OFS until November 28.