Stein Studios — Production Brief

Champagne Seas
Monaco Grand Prix 2026

A film for the people who lived it.

For Charlotte Moore

A note.

Charlotte — this is the working brief for the film we are making together.

This film is not about Jay or Kendal. They are the catalyst. They are the reason the room exists. They will welcome the camera at the gangway and then mostly recede. The film belongs to the guests — the friends and associates joining for the event. We are talking twenty-plus people across the weekend.

— Stein

The film in one sentence

A 5–7 minute tonal film that holds Monaco Grand Prix weekend aboard Champagne Seas — calm before, an interwoven climax of 007 elegance and race-day adrenaline, then a quiet heading-off into the next adventure — built around the guests, carried by their voices and the sound design of the city itself.

The Guest-First Principle

Jay and Kendal are the catalyst. The guests are the film.

Jay and Kendal make this weekend possible. They open the door. They will give us a brief on-camera welcome — warm, in their own words — and from there we let them mostly host, not narrate. They are interested in being on film. We will give them the imagined story so they can hold it in their heads, then we surprise them with what we make.

Everything else is the guests. Their faces at the gangway. Popping their first bottle of champagne. Their walks along the track. Their reactions when the engines build. Their dancing in 007 black-tie. Their last hugs at the gangway.

The story is driven by their voices — short, candid captures, sixty seconds maximum. Not interviews. Witness moments, where someone tells the camera what the room feels like while the room is still feeling like it.

"I'm an organic person. I think you inject the energy and that's what you get."

— Kendal Patry, on the call

That sentence is an aspect of the brief. The energy is reciprocal — we are not just catching it, we are flowing with it. We meet what the room gives us, and we add to it.

Kendal, in her own words

The brief, given to us straight.

From the call with Kendal Patry, April 30, 2026. These quotes are the brief. Read them slowly.

"In terms of story, I don't know if there is a story really. It's just kinda us, our friends having a great time."

"I'm an organic person. I think you inject the energy and that's what you get."

"Daytime is the slower magical sunlight stuff. People coming, going. The walks around the race. Then the ramp up to the evening."

"Saturday — a 007 theme night. Make it seem fancy and elegant. Then champagne, good times, good dancing, good music."

"Last year had a really great vibe, a really great feeling. The people that were there, and the music."

"Fly on the wall. Nothing pushy."

Locked operations

What we know.

Track access

We will be able to walk around the GP zone — exact level of access still to be determined. We'll see what's possible on the ground.

Slip

Across from last year's spot — team-headquarters side. Tucked beside a larger sheltering vessel. More accessible (guests walk on, no tender). Less iconic exterior framing from slip — exteriors must be earned from off-boat angles.

Daily timing

Guests onboard from 13:30 — Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Changeover ~17:00 each day. Nothing onboard before 13:30 — mornings are family / workout / crew prep.

Saturday

007 theme night. Tailoring. Heels on teak. The DJ at peak. The pole stage in motion. The film's emotional centerpiece.

Sunday

Race day proper. Lower energy. Many guests leaving. Movement III is short and quiet by design.

DJ

Same DJ as last year. "Probably put on the same show if not more so." Diegetic score throughout.

Pole stage

Confirmed. Performers across afternoons and evenings. Guest participation in the evenings. Film with reverence — composition matters here.

Camera posture

Fly on the wall. Nothing pushy. Witness, not performer.

Octopus, Antarctica.

M/Y Octopus, Antarctica.

Tone

Place.
People.
Memory.

Place. People. Memory.

The audio mandate

Sound design is an important feature of this film.

The audio of the people, the engines, the city, the harbor, the room — all of it moves the film forward alongside the picture. Treat sound as a co-author, not a layer applied at the end.

Pre-shoot homework

Recommend watching every Monaco-focused episode of Drive to Survive. Pay attention to the sounds. The whole place vibrates — engines through the city, off the water, off the harbor walls. Listen for what those episodes do with audio.

The opening sequence — silence to sonic wall

The first third of the film is a sonic wake-up. We do not announce the race. We let it announce itself.

  1. 01Pre-dawn — Monaco quiet. Water against the hull. A single bird. Rope creaking.
  2. 02First engine. A single car somewhere in the city turns over. Distant.
  3. 03The city wakes. Footsteps. A coffee machine. Servers crossing the quay. A radio.
  4. 04The rev builds. More engines. Closer. Practice laps somewhere.
  5. 05Full Monaco. The sonic wall. The city vibrating.
  6. 06Champagne Seas comes alive. The deck. A bottle uncorked. The first laugh at the gangway.

Earn the audience's ear before you give them anything to look at.

Audio capture priorities — every day

Lavs ready for any candid VO from Jay, Kendal, or any guest who opens up. Directional for everything else.

Three movements

The spine, before we choose an arc.

The film is not chronological. We break the temporal loop. The race weekend's apex and the 007 night's apex are cut against each other as one continuous climax — two energies, one peak.

Movement I

The Marina — calm before

Pre-dawn Monaco. The harbor still. Champagne Seas sleeping. Magical sunlight. The first guests arriving along the quay. Walks around the track in the slow daylight hours. Espresso. Sun. Water. The slow build. Jay greeting friends at the gangway. Kendal surveying the deck.

Anticipation, not announcement.

Movement II

The Climax — 007 elegance, woven with race-day adrenaline

The film's apex is not a sequence. It is a weave. Saturday's 007 night and Sunday's championship cut against one another into a single climax. The DJ's first drop landing on engines warming. A guest's laugh layered over an apex lap. Heels on teak intercut with tires on tarmac. The pole stage in motion as the championship rounds the harbor turn. Champagne pouring as a chequered flag falls somewhere out of frame. Guest voices threaded through both energies. Espresso martinis and pit-lane crackle in the same beat.

Two energies, one apex. 60–90% of the film's emotional weight lives here.

Movement III

Sunday — Championship Day

Race day. The big one. This is where we capture the actual F1 — the cars, the laps, the crowd, the city at full sound. The boat may be a touch quieter onboard, and that is the opportunity: pick up the energy of the people watching. Faces glued to the harbor turn. Guests pressed against the rail as the field thunders past. Hugs after a podium. A toast to whoever just won. Reactions. The crowd noise rolling over the deck. We are filming the championship from inside the room and from the rail itself.

Same energy as Saturday. Different shape. The race is the lead.

Some ideas

Three story arc ideas — open to interpretation.

Here are some ideas. They are starting points, not lock. I want this to be collaborative — push back on any of these, bring your own, and we'll find the film together.

Arc A

Elegant Chaos × Championship

The interwoven climax.

The film opens in the Marina's stillness, builds into a sustained climax that cross-cuts the 007 night with race-day adrenaline as one continuous energy, then resolves into a quiet heading-off. Champagne pours land on engine starts. Heels on teak land on tires on tarmac. A guest mid-laugh against an apex lap. Two apex moments — the DJ's peak drop and the championship's final laps — collapsed into one beat. Guest voices thread through both energies, sixty-second captures laid against the cut. The release is earned. The boat heads into the sunset.

Climax: The cross-cut peak — DJ drop and apex lap, intercut, one held breath.

Closing image: Champagne Seas heading off into the Med sunset — onto the next adventure.

Strengths: Honors the non-sequential brief. Two energies, one apex. The most cinematic.

Risks: The cross-cut has to land. Both sides need clean audio capture or the weave collapses.

Arc B

The City That Wakes

The audio-led arc.

The film's structure IS the sonic build of Monaco itself. Open in pre-dawn silence. Build through engines, city, harbor, guests arriving. Champagne Seas comes alive as the sonic field reaches her. Inside the boat the 007 elegance ramps; outside the city, the championship runs. The climax is the moment when those two sonic fields converge — the race outside and the party inside become one continuous wall of sound. Guest voices ride that wave. The film ends as the city quiets and the boat slips out of the harbor.

Climax: The convergence — race outside, party inside, one continuous sonic field.

Closing image: Champagne Seas leaving Monaco — the harbor quieting behind her, the open water ahead.

Strengths: Audio-led vision as structure, not flourish. Most original. Most "Stein Studios."

Risks: Demands disciplined audio capture from minute one.

Arc C

The Boat as Witness

The Champagne Seas portrait.

The film is structured as a portrait of Champagne Seas across the weekend. We open with her empty — spaces in the dawn light, alone, elegant, ready. She fills with people. We watch what they do to her. The climax is the boat at maximum life — pole stage in motion, deck a held frame of bodies and champagne and laughter, intercut with the championship rounding the harbor turn outside her windows. Then she empties. Then she casts off. The yacht stays the stable observer; everything else is the weather.

Climax: Champagne Seas at full life — every space alive — cut against race-day apex outside her hull.

Closing image: The boat in motion again. Lines off, harbor behind, open water ahead.

Strengths: Honors Champagne Seas as character. Doubles cleanly as a charter showcase. Solace-comparable.

Risks: Demands access to non-public spaces. Stein to confirm with Jay.

Open to interpretation

These are starting points, not lock. A composite is likely — Arc B's audio architecture, Arc A's interwoven climax, Arc C's boat-as-witness frame. Across all three: guests stay in the foreground, Jay and Kendal recede into hosts, the climax breaks chronological order, and the film ends with Champagne Seas heading off — onto the next memory.

Verite question library

Pre-loaded. Sixty seconds maximum.

Brief, candid moments. Not interviews. The camera should be running before the question is asked, and stay running after the answer ends. The breath before and after the answer is often the actual content.

Primary three (use these first, with most guests)

  1. "Describe where you are right now and how you're feeling."
  2. "Is there anything you want to share with Jay or Kendal while we're here?"
  3. "What's the one thing about this weekend you don't want to forget?"

Secondary three (use selectively)

  1. "What does it sound like here right now?" (Forces sonic awareness — always interesting answers.)
  2. "If you could keep one moment from today, which one?"
  3. "What surprised you?"

For Jay and Kendal

Same questions as above, plus a brief welcome moment. All captured Saturday or Sunday on the boat.

  1. "Welcome the camera to the weekend in your own words."
  2. "How does this feel right now?"
  3. "What does this weekend mean to you?"

Across all guests, lean into feeling. Ask emotion-first questions. "How does this feel?" beats "what is happening?" every time.

Ask, and see what they say. If they need a moment, give them one. If they want a follow-up — give them one of those too. Read the person in front of you. If they look away mid-answer, follow what they look at; the camera follows attention, not just words.

Solace tonal reference.
Solace, witness frame.

M/Y Solace — Stein Studios, January 2026.

Do / Don't

The line, drawn.

Do

  • — Capture the empty boat before guests arrive
  • — Lavs ready for Jay and Kendal's welcome moment
  • — Hold static frames for 8–10 seconds
  • — Capture the DJ build, peak, and come-down
  • — Capture the actual race on Sunday — cars, laps, crowd
  • — Film guest reactions to the championship
  • — Film the pole performance with reverence
  • — Walk the harbor with Stein before the event
  • — Bring the bracelets every day
  • — Pre-load the verite questions

Don't

  • — Stage anyone, ever
  • — Run a single interview-style sit-down
  • — Use hand-held shaky energy work
  • — Engineer family moments
  • — Cut a generic race-broadcast highlights sequence
  • — Frame the pole performance as spectacle

Pre-shoot homework — Charlotte

Complete before arriving in Monaco.

  1. 01Watch: Drive to Survive — Monaco episodes, every season. Listen, don't watch.
  2. 02Watch: the Stein Studios M/Y Solace film. Stein will send Vimeo links. Closest tonal reference.
  3. 03Watch: any Aman or Edition Hotels film. Editorial restraint, not lifestyle vlog.
  4. 04Map: the GP track around the harbor. Identify three vantage points for slow exterior shots.
  5. 05Prepare: ten variations of the verite questions. Deliver them naturally.
  6. 06Walk the harbor with Stein before the event — let's plan to walk around together, maybe Thursday. We'll lock the exteriors and the rail vantage points before guests are onboard.

Deliverables & timeline

What we ship, when.

Rough cut / 12-min stringout

DaVinci timeline export

48 hrs post-event

Final 5-min film

16:9 master, 4K, ProRes + H.264

1 week post-event

30-second teaser

16:9, social-shareable but not vertical

1 week post-event

Photo selects

40–60 images, color-graded

1 week post-event

Music license: open. Private film.

Closing note

"It's always about the people. The cars are cool, but they enrich the perspective of the people. The whole day is revving up. The sound vibrates throughout the entire city. That's the feeling."

— Stein

Charlotte — make this film for the dozen friends who fly into Monaco for three days and become someone's favorite weekend of the year. Make it for the room they walk into, the room they make, and the room they leave behind.

Jay and Kendal open the door. The guests are the film. The camera is a witness.

The mandate is restraint. The mandate is presence. Bring it home.

— Stein

M/Y Solace — Stein Studios, January 2026.