Jeremy Podeswa (The Pacific, The Tudors) has come on board to direct The Borgias for Showtime and CTV, while fellow Canuck Paul Sarossy (Death Comes to Town, Chloe) will lense the 10-part cable drama about a Renaissance Italian crime family.

Other homegrown elements for the Canada/Hungary/Ireland coproduction include François Séguin as production designer, and newcomer actor François Arnaud joining the cast as Cesare Borgia, the ruthless son of Rodrigo, to be played by Jeremy Irons.

Colm Feore was earlier cast as Rodrigo’s arch-nemesis, Cardinal Giuliano Della Rovere.

The Borgias, also to air on Bravo!, is coproduced by Toronto’s Take 5 Productions, with Bill Goddard as coproducer. Executive producers are Sheila Hockin and John Weber in Toronto, James Flynn, Neil Jordan and Michael Hirst in the U.K.

The drama is set to be shot in Hungary this summer before an early 2011 airdate.