Nicole grew up in extreme circumstances, but she couldn't get past the legal test for a downward departure.

The difference from project to project is that departure point. In this case, it was really an abstract idea, an issue of citizenship, but it might be a Chekhov short story or a story from 'The Iliad.' You can really fit anything in there, but what's consistent is that the writer and the director are chosen, the actors are all present before the play begins.

This was extreme circumstances,'' said Pat Courtney, a spokesman for Major League Baseball.

Attitude is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than what people do or say. It is more important than appearance, giftedness, or skill.

It was left to Nicole to raise her sister and her niece, and she didn't know how to do all of those things.

Her grandmother was a drug dealer. Her mother was a drug addict, and she never knew her father. Nicole had a child at 18 and had to raise the child alone because the father was convicted of murder.