Cyndi Lauper - She Bop

What this video is

Released July 2, 1984, 'She Bop' emerged at the apex of Cyndi Lauper's commercial breakthrough, becoming her third consecutive top-five Billboard Hot 100 hit and peaking at #3 in September 1984. The song and video arrived amid a national debate about pop music's lyrical content: the track was placed on the Parents Music Resource Center's 'Filthy Fifteen' list in 1984, a controversy that directly contributed to the…

Why it matters

A defining artifact of 1980s New Wave and synth-pop crossover, 'She Bop' synthesized electro-pop production with feminist subject matter years before such themes became commercially normalized. Its hybrid live-action/animation video format was innovative for the era and expanded the formal…

The director

Edd Griles was a music video director active in the early-to-mid 1980s, closely associated with Cyndi Lauper's visual identity during her breakthrough period. He directed several of Lauper's most celebrated videos, including 'Girls Just Want to Have Fun,'…