A play about caste discrimination at a fictional Silicon Valley aerospace company opened at the Lucie Stern Theatre on Wednesday, July 8, kicking off TheatreWorks Silicon Valley's 56th season with a story drawn from real Bay Area legal battles over workplace hierarchy.

Burlingame playwright Geetha Reddy's "The Employee Dharma Handbook" runs through Sunday, Aug. 2, at 1305 Middlefield Road in Palo Alto. Tickets range from $54 to $104.

The plot follows Leela, a first-generation Indian American engineer whose doctor parents recently revealed they belong to the Dalit caste, historically called "the untouchables." When she's passed over for a promotion by a director from the Brahmin caste, an HR executive named Val steps in to investigate. What begins as a routine staffing inquiry spirals into questions about ancient social hierarchies operating inside a modern American workplace.

Reddy told the San Francisco Chronicle in early July that the collision of systems drove her writing. "You have the caste system at work, and you have the capitalist system of work," she said. "They're both systems of worker exploitation. It was really interesting to me to see how these corporate cultures and an actual culture intersect."

She drew inspiration from a 2020 lawsuit filed in San Jose Federal Court against Cisco and two of its engineers by the California Civil Rights Department, alleging caste discrimination.

The production is directed by Snehal Desai, artistic director of Center Theatre Group in Los Angeles, in his TheatreWorks debut. It runs 90 minutes with no intermission.

The cast features Megan Suri ("Never Have I Ever") as Leela, Kapil Talwalkar as the Brahmin director Krish, Kathryn Smith-McGlynn as HR executive Val, Kunal Dudheker ("Silicon Valley," "Hacks") as the promoted engineer Baasu, and Ranjita Chakravarty as company founder C.K.

Talwalkar, a Cupertino native, is among the cast members who see the play landing close to home. One-quarter of Silicon Valley's tech employees are born in India, second only to U.S.-born workers, according to the 2026 Silicon Valley Index.

Mountain View Voice critic Michael J. Vaughn, reviewing the production on July 15, called it "a brain-buzzing puzzle of class, bias and work in the 21st century" that "also manages to be funny." He noted physical comedy from Dudheker's Baasu, who gets a laugh when offered an exercise ball instead of a chair, and singled out a dazzling wrap costume by designer Lisa Misako Claybaugh that drew its own applause from the opening-night audience.

The play was developed through TheatreWorks' 2025 New Works Festival and is a recipient of the company's Kurjan/Butler commission. Post-show discussions with the cast are scheduled for July 22 and July 29 both at 7:30 p.m. An ASL-interpreted performance takes place July 23 at 7:30 p.m.