--- title: Watch Lupita Nyong'o's Salt-N-Peppa Lip Sync Battle Video description: Lupita Nyongo brought the heat when she gave a scorchingly hot performance of Salt-N-Pepa's "Whatta Man" during Lip Sync battle. canonical: https://time.com/4556483/lupita-nyongo-lip-sync-battle-whatta-man/ author: Cady Lang article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-11-03T17:59:04.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:38:22.442Z og:title: Watch Lupita Nyong'o Cover Salt-N-Pepa's "Whatta Man" og:description: The Oscar winner gave a steamy Lip Sync Battle performance og:url: https://time.com/4556483/lupita-nyongo-lip-sync-battle-whatta-man/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Watch Lupita Nyong'o Cover Salt-N-Pepa's "Whatta Man" twitter:description: The Oscar winner gave a steamy Lip Sync Battle performance twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Watch Lupita Nyong'o Slay Salt-N-Pepa's 'Whatta Man' Surrounded by Firefighters > Sponsored content. 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Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically.  by [Cady Lang](https://time.com/author/cady-lang/)  ## Cady Lang Nov 3, 2016 5:59 PM UTC  by [Cady Lang](https://time.com/author/cady-lang/)  ## Cady Lang Nov 3, 2016 5:59 PM UTC [Lupita Nyong’o ](http://time.com/4504569/lupita-nyongo-jay-z-song/)brought the house down during an appearance on _Lip Sync Battle_, where she took on Regina Hall’s impression of [The Weeknd’s “Earned It (Fifty Shades of Grey)”](http://time.com/3645558/the-weeknd-50-shades-of-grey-soundtrack-song/) with a steamy homage to Salt-N-Pepa’s classic, “Whatta Man.” The Oscar winner pulled out all the stops as she enlisted a girl gang and shirtless firemen to back up her undeniably impressive dance moves and perfect lip-syncing. It shouldn’t be a surprise that Nyong’o is a triple threat — we already saw her show off her skills when [she dropped a hot sixteen as her rap alter ego “Troublemaker” in September.](http://time.com/4508134/lupita-nyongo-rap/) It looks like Salt-N-Pepa is having a moment as well — between [Queen Bey, Blue Ivy, and Tina Knowles-Lawson dressing up as them for Halloween](http://time.com/4551352/beyonce-blue-ivy-tina-knowles-salt-n-pepa-halloween-costume/) and Lupita bringing back “Whatta Man,” this is their week for throwbacks. 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