For most of us, getting into prison isn't especially hard. Try it sometime. With a bit of effort and a blunt object, a guy can usually land on the wrong side of the bars faster'n you can say "assault with intent."

Not so for The Boom, the sketch and video troupe that, in a bid to flex its comedic muscles, recently tried to find work at the Don Jail.

"We really wanted to do a jail tour," says Dan Galea, something in the spirit of Johnny Cash, but with laughs. "But I don't think they want to excite the prisoners, whether it's with nudity or 'fight the power'" — and there are healthy doses of both in the Boom's repertoire.

(And yet, the troupe appears to enjoy both music and a challenge — maybe they could set a sketch to something from At Fulsom Prison. "Cocaine Blues"? How about "The Long Black Veil"?)

"We just want to do something different," Galea explains. Which is why the 10-member troupe make a point of traveling, whether outside Toronto or down into the US, in between their regular appearances at Supermarket.

"If you don't you're screwed. Comedy Bar, the Rivoli, Second City — those are great rooms but you know what to expect from them [i.e., as a performer]," he says. Familiarity sets in with each room's audience and its expectations. "But I don't know what to expect from a jail."

And he won't find out any time soon, though the not-ready-for-hard-time players now hope to do shows for the army instead.

"They do like getting those guys excited," he notes dryly.

The Boom has apparently learned a lesson from its previous incarnation as Boom Shaka Laka, which was a feature at the Brunswick House before it backed away from comedy.

The familiar crowds and easy pace of monthly appearances made the original members "a little complacent" admits Eytan Millstone. "Being kicked out kicked us into gear."

That, and the arrival of Galea, who came on as head writer and producer, bringing talent and promotional savvy from his alma mater, The Sketchersons. Being plugged into that troupe's extended family, and into the Humber College crowd through the original members, swelled the ranks of the core members and their guest performers. ("We're trying to build a family that people can get to know."). Nikki Payne and Deborah Etta Robinson of Wet & Sticky signed on, and the troupe has close ties with speed-punk outfit Preposterous and video whizzes The Wrong Box, which has done work on The Boom's shorts including Two Girls, One Cup: Defenders Of Justice, a spandex-y riff on the stomach-turning scat porn video.

"Most of the material we're putting out right now is this South Park-y, I don't want to say 'edgy' but really edgy stuff," says Galea. "We're trying to take stuff that's topical from news or the internet and put our own spin on it. Like, what if you used powers to shit in a cup and used it to fight crime?"

What indeed. It's a shame they can't ask the guys locked up in the Don.