"Excuse I" correctness

Solution 1:

Just a playful abuse of the language.

"I" is a subject pronoun, so this would be correct if he were doing the excusing, and meant the same as "I excuse". But in an imperative like this, "excuse me" is correct.

Solution 2:

It is often used although usually tongue in cheek (ie a joke). I believe it originally comes from people mocking those that replace "me" with "I" thinking that this is correct grammar. In actual fact "me" is the correct pronoun. People often use this without realising the irony in the expression "excuse I".

I believe this "deliberate" error comes from a general incorrect trend to replace "me" with "I" such as "She came to the restaurant with my mum and I". The "I" should actually be "me" since the preposition makes I me but many now think because there are two people they should say "person X and I".

Solution 3:

The malapropism "Excuse I" is attributable to Dame Edna Everage, a character performed by Barry Humphries.

Excuse I!'' she said in a high, quavery voice, then sang one of her old songs about her favourite colour, maroon, or ''maroan''

from The Sydney Morning Herald