After a three-decade tenure on the Las Vegas Boulevard, the performers from the production Jubilee! gave one last perfectly timed kick in 2016. The production, famous for its ornate costumes crafted by celebrated designer Bob Mackie, came to an end due to dwindling audience numbers and critical critics who called it a spectacle “trapped in time”.
Currently, roughly eight years later, the showgirl, or at least the showgirl aesthetic, is back.
The Master of Sequins
Dubbed the “king of sparkle”, Mackie has made theatrical showgirl glitz his defining aesthetic, dressing everyone from Marilyn Monroe to pop royalty. Recently, a “naked” bodysuit he made for Cher in 1978 fetched $57,600, well over its estimated price, while a metallic tasseled bodysuit with lamé wings that Mackie created for Tina Turner for a 1977 performance sold for $19,200.
“I believe it looks more appealing for the new generation of stars who is looking for something other than what they knew from childhood”, he explained to a newspaper. “Contemporary performers are pushing toward a glamorous, more theatrical, attention-grabbing, grand statement.”
A Mainstream Revival
It’s a look that sashayed all the way to the epicenter of popular culture in 2025 propelled by Taylor Swift. Recently, the music phenomenon wore one of Mackie’s vintage Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her 12th studio album. The bedazzled bra and thong, ostrich-feather armbands and sparkly headpiece were tailor-made for a record named The Life of a Showgirl.
Swift isn't alone. This year, showgirl references have been embraced by pop stars including Miley Cyrus as they whizzed across world tours in sparkles, strategic openings and feathers, spotlighted against overstated sets. Lipa’s stylist her creative director told a style publication he wanted to bring “a stage persona” to her Radical Optimism tour – inspired by pictures from the mid-century, Lipa’s dancers fluttered giant feathered fans.
Pulling from the Past
These artists and other chart toppers also draw on historical entertainment forms, including vaudeville and chorus line references. The outcome are vastly different from the late-century pop style of revealing tops and cargo pants, and street-style dance moves that preceded this trend.
But some critics are on board with this showgirl renaissance. Nancy Hardy, a former Jubilee! showgirl who entertained in the 00s says the trend is “bemusing”. She thinks the word showgirl is being “employed as an umbrella term including everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now apparently today's icons.”
A Highly Sought-After Classic Style
For millennial and modern stars, Mackie’s classic designs have become highly covetable. In 2024, a famous actress paid tribute to one of Mackie’s iconic muses, Cher, when the star wore a see-through beaded dress made by the designer in 2001, which was similar to one he designed for Cher to wear in 1967. Months after, Miley Cyrus paid an private amount to buy the Mackie tasseled mini dress she had worn earlier in the year to perform at the Grammys. In September, the singer wore a series of vintage Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a hit among collectors.
“Showgirls inspire fond memories for a bygone era of glitz,” says Su Kim Chung, an expert at the a Las Vegas university, who documents the legacy of showgirls. “Currently it is considered a sort of ‘safe’ allure because it has been updated. It has got all the glamour, the sparkles and the glitter but without the bare skin.”
A Than Just Style: An Icon of the City
The expert says the showgirl image are integral to the iconography of Vegas. She points to one-time leader Oscar Goodman who, during public appearances, was surrounded by two showgirls. While Las Vegas no longer has any showgirl-centric productions, Chung says they are still featured as an emblem of the city, showing up at corporate events and in promotional material. “The showgirl is still a remaining figure of Las Vegas glitz and glamour,” she says.
The Appeal of Transformation
The former showgirl says the complete change of a showgirl persona is part of the attraction. This idea the singer alludes to in a latest behind-the-scenes film that shows the off-camera action from her extensive 2023 Eras tour, which included intense rehearsals, gym sessions and 149 performances across 21 countries, each lasting 3.5 hours.
She recalls her own stage routines as “comparable to completing an endurance race in high heels every night”. Her feathered headdress weighed 34lbs. “I had to carry it all the way up the staircase to the stage from the green rooms three floors below in the underground. I had to start early for my entrance so I could catch my breath before I went on stage. You are perspiring the whole time but maintaining this fantasy that it’s easy and beautiful and dreamlike.”
Maybe this is where the fascination of the showgirl fantasy really resides. In the complexity of 2025 there is a longing for fantasy. Who better to turn to than these performers, who have always represented dreams, flawlessness and a universe where no one misses a mark.
