After a three-decade stint on the Las Vegas Boulevard, the dancers from the revue Jubilee! took a final choreographed kick in 2016. The extravaganza, known for its elaborate costumes designed by celebrated designer Bob Mackie, closed its doors due to dwindling audience numbers and unimpressed reviewers who described it as a spectacle “a relic of another era”.
Today, roughly eight years later, showgirls, or at least the glamorous showgirl look, is experiencing a revival.
A Sultan of Glitz
Dubbed the “master of glitz”, Mackie has made dramatic showgirl glitz his defining aesthetic, dressing everyone from Marilyn Monroe to music superstars. Earlier this month, a “naked” bodysuit he made for Cher in 1978 fetched $57,600, well over its initial estimate, while a metallic fringed bodysuit with reflective wings that Mackie created for Tina Turner for a 1977 concert sold for $19,200.
“I think it looks more appealing for the new generation of stars who is desiring something other than what they knew from childhood”, he stated in an interview with a publication. “Contemporary performers are striving for a show-stopping, more dramatic, attention-grabbing, entrance-making statement.”
A Musical Resurgence
It’s a look that made its way all the way to the centre of popular culture in 2025 propelled by Taylor Swift. Recently, the entertainment titan wore one of Mackie’s original Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her latest record. The rhinestone encrusted bra and thong, ostrich-feather armbands and shimmering headpiece were tailor-made for a record named The Life of a Showgirl.
She isn't alone. This year, glamorous nods have been adopted by music artists including Dua Lipa as they whizzed across concert platforms in sequins, cut-outs and plumes, highlighted against theatrical sets. Her fashion curator her creative director mentioned in an interview with Vogue he wanted to bring “a stage persona” to her Radical Optimism tour – inspired by pictures from the 50s, her performers fluttered giant ostrich feather fans.
Pulling from the Past
Modern stars and other successful musicians also draw on classic performances, including burlesque and chorus line references. The results are worlds away from the 90s pop style of crop tops and baggy pants, and hip-hop inspired dance moves that preceded this trend.
But not everyone are on board with this glamour resurgence. Nancy Hardy, a former Jubilee! showgirl who danced in the 00s says the trend is “puzzling”. She thinks the word showgirl is being “treated as an catch-all phrase encompassing everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now apparently today's icons.”
A Coveted Classic Style
For gen Z and modern stars, Mackie’s vintage designs have become highly covetable. In 2024, a style icon honored to one of Mackie’s earliest clients, Cher, when the star wore a translucent embellished dress designed by the designer in 2001, which was inspired by one he created for Cher to wear in 1967. Months after, another pop star paid an private amount to buy the Mackie tasseled mini dress she had worn at an awards show to perform at the Grammys. In September, Sabrina Carpenter wore a trio of vintage Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a popular item among collectors.
“Showgirls inspire nostalgia for a bygone era of glitz,” says a historian, a curator at the an academic institution, who studies the story of showgirls. “Today it is considered a sort of ‘toned-down’ sexy because it has been adapted. It has got all the glamour, the rhinestones and the shine but without the exposure.”
More Than Just Style: An Symbol of Vegas
She says this figure are integral to the imagery of Las Vegas. She points to ex-mayor Oscar Goodman who, during official events, was surrounded by two showgirls. Even though Las Vegas no longer has any showgirl-based productions, the historian says they are still employed as an symbol of the city, appearing at conventions and in promotional material. “The showgirl is still a lasting icon of Vegas spectacle,” she says.
The Appeal of Illusion
Hardy says the complete change of a showgirl persona is part of the appeal. This is a notion the singer alludes to in a latest docuseries that shows the off-camera action from her massive 2023 Eras tour, which included exhausting rehearsals, workouts and numerous concerts across 21 countries, each running for 3.5 hours.
The performer recalls her own nights in the spotlight as “comparable to completing an endurance race in stilettos every night”. Her headpiece weighed 34lbs. “I had to support it all the way up the steps to the performance area from the green rooms three floors below in the basement. I had to start early for my entrance so I could catch my breath before I made my entrance. One is perspiring the whole time but maintaining this fantasy that it’s effortless and gorgeous and ethereal.”
Maybe this is where the appeal of the showgirl fantasy really resides. In the complexity of 2025 there is a longing for a break from reality. Is there anyone better to turn to than such icons, who have always represented dreams, flawlessness and a world where no one makes a mistake.
