Cue the orchestra for the best international drama at the Gemini Awards.

That’s right.

The Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television on Tuesday unveiled its latest rule changes for Canada’s TV awards, including a new category for international co-productions with minimal Canadian participation like the period dramas The Borgias (pictured) and The Tudors that were shot in Europe and posted in Toronto.

“In recent years, the number of international co-productions on Canadian television has been growing,” Academy chair Martin Katz explained in a statement.

“With the introduction of this new category – best international drama – series such as The Borgias will compete directly with mini-series such as The Pillars of the Earth, for example, which is fitting,” he added.

The rule change will also give recognizably Canadian dramas shot locally like The Republic of Doyle and Bomb Girls a better chance to win the best Canadian drama competition.

That category in recent years has been dominated by European costume dramas like The Borgias, a Canada-Hungary-Ireland co-production about an Italian Renaissance crime family, and The Tudors, a Canada-Ireland co-production, this time about scheming and sex in the court of Henry VIII.

Such splashy international co-productions, which require steep budgets to be spread across a number of international markets and partners, are popular with Canadian TV viewers.

But they also stretch the mandate of the Gemini Awards to celebrate the best in Canadian TV.

The last Canadian drama made in Canada that won the Gemini for best drama was Flashpoint in 2009.

There’s also likely to be a little less celebrating at the Geminis, as the Academy cut the number of award categories by 20% by merging or eliminating competitions.

But given the Geminis in recent years ballooned to over 100 categories, there will still be lots of hardware handed out when the Geminis next take place over three nights next summer, culminating with a gala broadcast on September 5, 2012.

And the Geminis has changed the vote weighting for categories to a 50/50 split between juries and Academy members, while allowing members in the TV and digital divisions to vote in all award categories.