It differs by driver. Here are two examples:
import MySQLdb
mc = MySQLdb.connect()
r = mc.cursor()
r.execute('select %s, %s', ("foo", 2))
r._executed
"select 'foo', 2"
import psycopg2
pc = psycopg2.connect()
r = pc.cursor()
r.execute('select %s, %s', ('foo', 2))
r.query
"select E'foo', 2"