The Musical that Isn't

 Stuck for ideas today (again!) I turned to 5-minute daiy writing prompts and picked this:

"Brainstorm ideas for a quirky musical that, as far as you know, has not been written."

I love musicals. I grew up listening to the soundtracks of many musicals because my Dad also loved musicals. We had the songs from Carousel, The Sound of Music, West Side Story, South Pacific, and more that I don't remember at the moment on LPs. 

Most musicals, at least the old ones from my youth, came from books. I looked up lists of recent popular novels. Bel Canto by Ann Patchett has been made into an opera. We saw it at Lyric Opera of Chicago and liked it. 

But, a QUIRKY musical -- I want to take the character Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation, and put him in a story with Elizabeth Bennet from Pride and Prejudice and Sherlock Holmes. Data would be delighted to be paired up with Holmes since he has already played that part in the Enterprise's Holodeck. But Elizabeth Bennet? What would he make of her? 

The plot would need to be a mystery to solve. 

Imagine my surprise when I googled "mystery ideas with Sherlock Holmes, Elizabeth Bennet and Data" and found that there is already a series (two books as of now) of mysteries with Holmes and Miss Elizabeth! I only need to add Data. And this has morphed into a novel, no longer a musical.

Time travel has happened in the Star Trek universe, so Data will travel back in time to the Regency Era and meet Miss Elizabeth. At a ball? That he accidentally finds himself at? Data will understand much about this time period, but not how to act so as not to draw attention to himself. Sherlock Holmes needs a logical reason to be in this story so he can investigate this strange being. Elizabeth will be her normal witty and observant self -- but what will she make of Data? 

This sounds like a lot of fun.