'It's my country': Mike Myers reveals why he's 'elbows up' for Canada

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Almost any chance he gets, Mike Myers, who lives in the U.S., has always made a point to tell people how much he loves being from Canada.

Back in March, amid U.S. President Donald Trump’s repeated calls to make his birth country a 51st state, Myers, 62, became a lightning rod for Canadian pride when he appeared on Saturday Night Live wearing a black “Canada is not for sale” T-shirt. As the credits rolled, Myers flexed his arm and mouthed “elbows up” to the camera, referencing a term that hockey great Gordie Howe had used to signal it’s time to fight back.

Making his first appearance since December 2015, Myers popped up earlier in the episode as a chainsaw-wielding Elon Musk, the tech billionaire who owns X, Space X and Tesla and is pals with Trump.

Later that month, Myers threw his support behind Prime Minister Mark Carney and the Liberals, rallying voters with that same “elbows up” message. Political neophyte Carney leveraged the slogan, repeating it on the campaign trail as he promised Canadians he was the right leader to fight back against Trump’s threats of annexation and tariffs.

We love Americans. But we can love Americans and not want to be Americans

Mike Myers sparked a political movement with his 'elbows up' gesture on 'SNL'

In April, Myers returned once again, this time sporting a Canadian Tire T-shirt he said was meant to encourage people to buy locally made products.

In a nearly 20-minute interview that aired on CBC’s The National this week, Myers said he wasn’t trying to start a movement with his gesture and the garment he bought off Amazon. “I knew I was going to wear the T-shirt … I had no plan … I was up there and I got more and more angry,” Myers said. “It was just, ‘Leave us alone’ … We love Americans. But we can love Americans and not want to be Americans, you know what I mean? There’s a difference.”

Myers said he didn’t have a strong recollection of doing the “elbows up” signal, but told CBC’s Paul Hunter he couldn’t “stay quiet.”

After his brother told him how the moment on SNL had gone viral and sparked a wave of nationalistic pride, Myers said he was happy that he wasn’t the only one who was bristling at Trump’s talk of Canada becoming the 51st state.

Myers, who has lived in the U.S. for more than 30 years, said that he wouldn’t have had a career if it wasn’t for being Canadian.

“I would be nothing without Canada,” he admitted. “The Canadian taxpayer put money into the government, the government subsidized our rent when I was a kid. They accepted my parents from Liverpool, England … put my parents’ kids through very fantastic high schools … I would have gone to York University, that would have been subsidized. I worked at the CBC … That’s taxpayer money. That somebody paid their taxes is why I’m here.”

Myers namechecked the TV program he got into at Stephen Leacock Collegiate Institute in Scarborough and told Hunter that even if he hadn’t been born here, he’d still want to be Canadian.

“I like our vibe. I like who we are. I think it’s great,” Myers said. “So for me, it came from a place of, ‘They brought me to the dance — Canada — it’s my country.'”

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Myers — who also has U.K. citizenship — has lived in the U.S. for more than half his life, but he said “there’s a sanity” when he returns home.

“There’s a vibe here. My shoulders drop down to my hips. My jaw unclenches,” he said. “There’s a reasonableness. There’s a grown-upness that is unique to this country.”

Myers also talked about his viral ad with Carney in which he gabbed with the Liberal leader while taking in a hockey game in a Team Canada jersey.

“It seemed that Carney was left, but a centrist at a time when we would probably need to unify against enemies, foreign and domestic,” the father of three said.

The Wayne’s World star knows that his critics like to point to the fact that he doesn’t live or pay taxes here, but that didn’t stop him from speaking out.

“Everybody knows I don’t live here,” he said. But he recalled how SNL creator and producer Lorne Michaels told him, “‘Painters go to Paris. Rome ruled by the sword and Britain by the three-masted ship. And America’s ruled by the moving image … everybody is from elsewhere.'”

That Trump hasn’t backed down from his dream of seeing Canada become part of the U.S. has only strengthened Myers’ resolve, who said he’s “inspired” to see Canadians standing up to the president’s rhetoric.

Just this past weekend, Trump told Fox News, “Canada should be the 51st state. It really should, because Canada relies entirely on the United States, we don’t rely on Canada.”

“I like what Prime Minister Carney is doing (when he responds to Trump’s threats of annexation and says), ‘That’s not going to happen,'” Myers said. “Yeah, that’s not going to happen because it isn’t.”

On YouTube, where the interview has generated more than 31,000 views, CBC turned off comments. But on X, Myers’ interview divided Canadians.

Plenty took aim at Myers for living and paying taxes in the U.S., but one person questioned why it was he had to leave in the first place. “Wouldn’t it be great if we created the conditions where he wouldn’t have to leave to be successful?” they asked.

“He became wealthy in the U.S., Canada can only take you so far. It is a land of mediocrity. Not excellence,” another observed.

The “elbows up” movement has also taken a hit this week with merch sales sagging and Carney dropping a proposed digital services tax on American tech giants. 

White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said Carney “caved to President Trump and the United States of America.”

But Myers said it’s good to be Canadian. “Why is it bad to be polite? Why is it bad to be nice .. to be tempered in your opinion? To not always hurl invective … Isn’t that what we’re supposed to do? Isn’t that what being an adult is?” he asked. “That is a tenet of Canada. Truth with kindness.”

mdaniell@postmedia.com