Devoted to A. Einstein

It’s 1934 and Albert Einstein, having fled Nazi Germany, has arrived in New Jersey but has yet to appear at a scheduled news conference. His harried private secretary, trying to placate restless reporters, begins fielding questions about the iconic physicist’s life and work.

What follows, in Kres Mersky’s one-woman play, “The Life and Times of A. Einstein,” is a seriocomic portrait of a man of “great intellectual courage” and of the woman who devoted most of her life to him.

Set during three news conferences, from 1934 to 1955 -- the third on the occasion of Einstein’s death -- Mersky’s touring show is part of 24th Street Theatre’s ongoing “Saturday Explorer Series,” an annual program of sophisticated family entertainment.

The character Mersky plays is “very loosely” based on Helen Dukas, who “spent 30 years as his personal secretary, his watchdog and maybe something else -- there are hints that they could have been involved.”

Although the secretary is mostly Mersky’s creation, she stuck to facts in her oblique approach to Einstein.

“I don’t claim to understand the theory of relativity,” she said, “but his courage in making this huge leap, in breaking from all notions of what was accepted in physics at the time, that’s very exciting to me. He was a humanitarian, a pacifist and outspoken and very brave; and he was difficult.

“It’s not a children’s play,” Mersky said, “but it’s definitely good for ages 12 and up, perhaps even a bit younger. There’s a lot of humor and poignancy in it -- and science too.”

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‘The Life and Times of A. Einstein’

Where: 24th Street Theatre, 1117 W. 24th St., L.A., Saturday, 1 p.m.

Cost: Free; reservations are advised.

Info: (213) 745-6515