In Jab Khuli Kitaab, Saurabh Shukla the director cast Saurabh Shukla the actor reluctantly. "I'm in one of the main roles, which is an accident," he says over the phone from Lucknow. "I never wanted to be in that role. I tried many actors, but it's not easy to find seasoned, working actors for theatre, because everybody has some work or the other. I kept trying, I kept trying, I kept trying, and I realised that if I kept waiting, I'll lose this production. So, I decided to step in."

When Shukla repeated the same sentiment to another seasoned, working actor, Danish Husain, outside Prithvi Theatre one day, Husain did the only sensible thing: he volunteered. Hence, Jab Khuli Kitaab is packed with well-loved actors such as Shukla, Husain and Irawati Harshe, and 22 other old and new faces. "You have to understand that this has been a real nightmare," says Shukla, of the casting. "There are approximately 25 people onstage. This is a humongous, huge cast by any standard. A small stage will not be able to [host] so many people." Since Aadyam, the Aditya Birla Group's annual theatre initiative, doesn't do small, the two found a perfect match in each other.