After a three-decade run on the iconic Vegas strip, the performers from the production Jubilee! took a final choreographed kick in 2016. The production, famous for its intricate costumes created by American fashion designer Bob Mackie, closed its doors due to falling audience numbers and critical reviewers who described it as a spectacle “a relic of another era”.
Currently, almost a decade later, the showgirl, or at least the glamorous showgirl look, is experiencing a revival.
A Master of Sequins
Known as the “sultan of sequins”, Mackie has made theatrical showgirl glamour his signature style, clothing everyone from screen legends to Madonna. Earlier this month, a “naked” bodysuit he created for Cher in 1978 sold for $57,600, far exceeding its projected value, while a silver and gold tasseled bodysuit with lamé wings that Mackie created for Tina Turner for a 1977 performance sold for $19,200.
“I think it looks more attractive for the emerging artists who is desiring something other than what they were accustomed to”, he told a newspaper. “New stars are pushing toward a glamorous, more dramatic, breathtaking, entrance-making statement.”
A Pop Culture Comeback
It’s a look that made its way all the way to the epicenter of mainstream fashion in 2025 propelled by Taylor Swift. Recently, the entertainment titan wore one of Mackie’s classic Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her 12th studio album. The bedazzled bra and thong, ostrich-feather armbands and shimmering headpiece were tailor-made for a record called The Life of a Showgirl.
The singer is part of a trend. This year, showgirl inspirations have been incorporated by music artists including Sabrina Carpenter as they danced across world tours in sparkles, strategic openings and plumes, illuminated against theatrical sets. Lipa’s stylist a fashion expert explained to Vogue he wanted to bring “a stage persona” to her Radical Optimism tour – drawing from pictures from the 1950s, her performers waved giant feathered fans.
Pulling from History
These artists and other hitmakers also draw on 19th-century entertainment forms, including burlesque and dance line references. The results are vastly different from the 1990s era pop style of crop tops and baggy pants, and hip-hop inspired dance moves that came before them.
But certain observers are on board with this showgirl revival. Nancy Hardy, a former Jubilee! showgirl who performed in the early 2000s says the trend is “puzzling”. She thinks the word term is being “used as an catch-all phrase including everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now even today's icons.”
The Highly Sought-After Retro Style
For younger and millennial stars, Mackie’s classic designs have become highly covetable. In 2024, a style icon honored to one of Mackie’s first major stars, Cher, when the star wore a semi-sheer sequined dress designed by the designer in 2001, which was reminiscent of one he created for Cher to wear in 1967. Months after, another pop star paid an private amount to buy the Mackie beaded mini dress she had worn previously to perform at the Grammys. In September, Carpenter wore a trio of classic Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a hit among fashion collectors.
“The showgirl aesthetic inspire fond memories for a historical elegance,” says a historian, a curator at the an academic institution, who studies the history of showgirls. “Today it is considered a sort of ‘safe’ allure because it has been adapted. It has got all the sophistication, the crystals and the glitter but without the nudity.”
More Than Simply Style: An Symbol of Vegas
She says the showgirl image are key to the iconography of Las Vegas. She points to former mayor Oscar Goodman who, during civic functions, was accompanied by two showgirls. Although Las Vegas no longer has any traditional showgirl productions, Jung says they are still used as an logo of the city, appearing at gatherings and in promotional material. “The showgirl is still a lasting symbol of Vegas spectacle,” Chung says.
An Appeal of Escape
Hardy says the complete change of a stage character is part of the allure. It’s something Swift alludes to in a new behind-the-scenes film that captures the backstage action from her year-long 2023 Eras tour, which included exhausting preparations, workouts and countless performances across 21 countries, each running for 3.5 hours.
Hardy recalls her own nights in the spotlight as “like extreme physical exertion in high heels every night”. Her headpiece was 34lbs. “I had to support it all the way up the stairs to the platform from the green rooms three floors below in the lower level. I had to head up ahead of time for my moment so I could recover before I performed. You are working hard the whole time but maintaining this illusion that it’s effortless and beautiful and ethereal.”
It could be this is where the true allure of the showgirl really is found. In the complexity of 2025 there is a craving for fantasy. Who better to turn to than these performers, who have always embodied fantasy, flawlessness and a universe where no one makes a mistake.
