Following a three-decade tenure on the Las Vegas Boulevard, the performers from the production Jubilee! gave one last synchronised kick in 2016. The production, renowned for its elaborate costumes created by style icon Bob Mackie, came to an end due to dwindling audience numbers and disappointed critics who described it as a spectacle “a relic of another era”.
Today, almost a decade later, the showgirl persona, or at least the showgirl aesthetic, is back.
The Master of Sparkle
Known as the “king of sparkle”, Mackie has made over-the-top showgirl glamour his trademark look, outfitting everyone from Marilyn Monroe to music superstars. In a recent auction, a “barely-there” bodysuit he created for Cher in 1978 commanded $57,600, seven times its projected value, while a metallic fringed bodysuit with shiny wings that Mackie crafted for Tina Turner for a 1977 performance sold for $19,200.
“I believe it looks more attractive for the new generation of stars who is seeking something other than what they grew up with”, he stated in an interview with a newspaper. “Today's artists are striving for a show-stopping, more dramatic, show-stopping, entrance-making statement.”
The Pop Culture Resurgence
It’s a look that made its way all the way to the epicenter of popular culture in 2025 propelled by Taylor Swift. Earlier this year, the music phenomenon wore one of Mackie’s vintage Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her latest record. The bedazzled bra and thong, ostrich-feather armbands and glittering headpiece were tailor-made for a record named The Life of a Showgirl.
Swift is part of a trend. This year, showgirl inspirations have been incorporated by singers including Sabrina Carpenter as they danced across world tours in glitter, revealing designs and plumes, spotlighted against overstated sets. Her fashion curator Lorenzo Posocco told Vogue he wanted to bring “a showgirl spirit” 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 successful musicians also reference classic entertainment forms, including vaudeville and dance line references. The final look are poles apart from the 1990s era Britney Spears era of crop tops and utilitarian trousers, and urban dance moves that were popular earlier.
But not everyone are convinced with this glamour resurgence. Nancy Hardy, a former Jubilee! showgirl who entertained in the 00s says the trend is “puzzling”. She thinks the word showgirl is being “employed as an broad label including everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now seemingly today's icons.”
A Coveted Vintage Style
For millennial and millennial stars, Mackie’s vintage designs have become highly covetable. In 2024, a famous actress paid tribute to one of Mackie’s iconic muses, Cher, when the actor wore a semi-sheer beaded dress designed by the designer in 2001, which was reminiscent of one he created for Cher to wear in 1967. Subsequently, another pop star paid an private amount to buy the Mackie fringed mini dress she had worn earlier in the year to perform at the Grammys. In September, the singer wore a trio of vintage Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a hit among collectors.
“Showgirls bring about nostalgia for a past glamour,” says Su Kim Chung, a curator at the University of Nevada, who studies the legacy of showgirls. “Currently it is viewed as a sort of ‘acceptable’ allure because it has been updated. It has got all the sophistication, the rhinestones and the shine but without the bare skin.”
A Than Just Style: An Symbol of the City
She says this figure are central to the iconography of Las Vegas. She points to one-time leader Oscar Goodman who, during public appearances, was flanked by two showgirls. While Las Vegas no longer has any traditional showgirl productions, the historian says they are still employed as an symbol of the city, showing up at corporate events and in marketing. “The showgirl is still a enduring figure of Vegas glitz and glamour,” Chung says.
The Appeal of Escape
Nancy Hardy says the complete change of a showgirl is part of the attraction. It’s something the singer alludes to in a recent documentary series that shows the off-camera action from her massive 2023 Eras tour, which included intense rehearsals, gym sessions and numerous performances across 21 countries, each running for 3.5 hours.
The performer describes her own showgirl performances as “comparable to extreme physical exertion in heels every night”. Her headdress weighed 34lbs. “I had to carry it all the way up the staircase to the stage from the dressing rooms three floors below in the basement. I had to head up ahead of time for my entrance so I could rest before I went on stage. One is perspiring the whole time but crafting this image that it’s easy and beautiful and ethereal.”
It could be this is where the appeal of the showgirl really lies. In the complexity of 2025 there is a desire for a break from reality. Who better to turn to than such icons, who have always represented dreams, flawlessness and a realm where nobody misses a mark.
