(Cover) - EN Showbiz - Martin Scorsese's new television show is all about discovering "how much sin you can live with".

The legendary director helmed the pilot of Boardwalk Empire, which is based on Nelson Johnson's book, Boardwalk Empire: The Birth, High Times, and Corruption of Atlantic City, and is expected to be involved with the rest of the series.

The programme follows the beginnings of gangsters, showing how they came to prominence during the 1920s. Martin is proud of the show, and is sure it will have great appeal.

"You make a deal. You figure out how much sin you can live with," he told the dailybeast.com. "It's [about] the charting of the nature of this world, the underworld. And also the nature of America's love affair with the gangster as a sort of tragic hero... loving the gangster for doing everything he can't do, but wanting him to pay for it at the end."

Steve Buscemi plays Enoch 'Nucky' Thompson, Atlantic City's treasurer who is not adverse to helping himself to things he shouldn't. Despite his corruption Nucky is portrayed as knowing right from wrong, and his relationship with Margaret, played by Kelly Macdonald, is one of the key plotlines.

It was this which drew Steve to the series, as he likes the interaction between the two characters.

"I think Nucky has purposely picked women that he won't get so emotionally attached to," he explained. "When he meets Margaret... he sees somebody that he can give his heart to, potentially, and intellectually, he hasn't had that stimulation in a long time."

Boardwalk Empire will debut on HBO in America later this month. (C) Cover Media