Who performed Blame Canada at the 2000 Academy Awards?

Robin Williams performed “Blame Canada” at the 72nd Academy Awards in 2000. The song was nominated for Best Original Song after appearing in South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, but the Oscar telecast used Williams rather than the film’s principal voice performers.

In the movie, “Blame Canada” is performed by characters voiced by Trey Parker and Mary Kay Bergman. Parker wrote the lyrics with Marc Shaiman, who composed the music. That division of roles explains several common mix-ups: Parker and Shaiman created the song, while Williams delivered the famous live awards-show performance.

Williams’s number became one of the ceremony’s most memorable musical moments. It was staged as a large production featuring dancers dressed as Mounties and a deliberately extravagant presentation that matched the song’s satirical attack on scapegoating Canada for American social problems.

The song did not win the award. Phil Collins won for “You’ll Be in My Heart” from Tarzan. The 72nd Academy Awards were held on March 26, 2000, at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles.