The song became so popular that it ascended up the charts before a music video had even been shot for the song . The black and white video , directed by David Fincher and choreographed by Abdul herself in mid-January 1989 , won four 1989 MTV Video Music Awards for Best Female Video , Best Editing , Best Choreography , and the first Best Dance Video . The video features an appearance by her friend , comedian Arsenio Hall , whose popular talk show had premiered a few weeks prior to the video shoot . Djimon Hounsou also appears . Released later that month , the video at the time went into very heavy rotation on MTV , helping further Abdul 's popularity
1989 MTV Video Music Awards
1989 MTV Video Music Awards
Straight Up (Paula Abdul song)