Watching TheatreWorks Silicon Valley’s production of “The Employee Dharma Handbook” is a bit like eating an artichoke. The play is deftly directed by Snehal Desai, who helps his actors peel off their concerns, their needs, their prejudices, one tasty leaf at a time.
Local playwright Geetha Reddy obviously knows her way around Indian caste systems and how members of different ones can find nits to pick at one another — even in workplace environments.
Commissioned by TheatreWorks and on stage just down the street from a number of Silicon Valley’s top tech companies, “The Employee Dharma Handbook” is a story perfectly suited to 2026. Workers of Indian descent make up almost one-third of all Silicon Valley software developers and have become the fastest-growing ethnic group in a region that now has a larger share of Indians than anywhere else in the country.
In the midst of this burgeoning growth, high-profile discrimination cases have erupted at a number of nearby business firms (like Cisco Systems and Google) and have raised awareness of corporate cultural complexities.
Reddy is one of the first playwrights to have work produced through TheatreWorks’ Kurjan/Butler Commission, established by supporters Phil Kurjan and Noel Butler. She is a rapidly rising playwright who has previously had work commissioned and/or performed at multiple Bay Area venues, including Shotgun Players, SF Playhouse, Central Works, and Oakland Theatre Project. TheatreWorks Artistic Director Giovanna Sardelli calls her an “extraordinary writer,” and adds that “…when she shared “The Employee Dharma Handbook” with us, we selected it as part of our New Works Festival. We felt she had written a bold, fantastic, multilayered story that was perfect for TheatreWorks’ audiences.”
Performed with an intermission at Lucie Stern Theater in Palo Alto, the play runs about 95 minutes and is engaging for most of that time. There are, however, a few scenes that seem overly long or difficult to understand, especially when several actors speak a few lines in Telugu, one of India’s many languages. Although, on opening night, there were a number of people of Indian descent in the audience who laughed whenever Telugu was spoken, other audience members were left clueless about what was said.
Still, that detracted very little from the play, which, for the most part, was readily understandable.
Audience members should also take a moment to appreciate Wilson Chin’s highly flexible set design, which is frequently bathed in warm shades of blue. It’s primarily set in a modern lab that has a high-tech look with a rocket structure that twists and rotates high above the actors.
As Leela, a first-generation Indian American, Megan Suri is appropriately credible as she dons an all-blue jumpsuit while working in the lab at Sequoia Dynamics, a company that is building a rocket set to launch soon.
Leela believes that she may have been passed over for a promotion due to the fact that the person who was promoted is from a higher caste than she, rather than on the basis of his actual work on the rocket launch.
She takes her case to Val (a first-rate Kathryn Smith-McGlynn), the company’s Black diversity officer. Val listens attentively and recognizes that Leela’s complaint does indeed seem as if it is about being overlooked for the promotion — and may also be about India’s caste system.
All five actors are excellent. Vaishnavi Sridhar has done a fine job of working with the play’s actors as their Telugu coach, although a soft delivery at times makes some of the actors difficult to understand.
Although the story seems to have too many convenient coincidences, it is effective overall. It definitely helps educate audiences about India’s caste system and how it impacts the lives of American-born Indians in the U.S.
“The Employee Dharma Handbook,” presented by TheatreWorks Silicon Valley, through August 2, 2026, at Lucie Stern Theater in Palo Alto. For further information, click here.
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Rating: ***1/2 (For an explanation of TheatreStorm’s rating system, click here.)
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“The Employee Dharma Handbook,” by Geetha Reddy. A world premiere produced by TheatreWorks. Director: Snehal Desai. Scenic Designer: Wilson Chin. Costume Designer: Lisa Misako Claybaugh. Lighting Designer: Amith Chandrashaker. Sound Designer: Erin Bednarz. Artist Counselor: Judith Nihei. Additional Casting: Michael Donovan Casting, CSA. Stage Manager: Nick Carvalho. Assistant Stage Manager: Emily Anderson Wolf. Assistant Director: Miller Liberatore. Dramaturg: Ely Sonny Orquiza. Cultural Dramaturg: Sukanya Chakrabarti. Telugu Coach: Vaishnavi Sridhar. Vocal Coach: Kimberly Mohne Hill. Assistant Lighting Designers: Ed Hunter, Ben McAuliffe.
Cast
Baasu: Kunal Dudheker. C.K.: Ranjita Chakravarty. Val: Kathryn Smith-McGlynn. Leela: Megan Suri. Krish: Kapil Talwalker.
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