Following a three-decade run on the Las Vegas Boulevard, the dancers from the production Jubilee! took a final perfectly timed kick in 2016. The production, renowned for its ornate costumes crafted by style icon Bob Mackie, closed its doors due to dwindling audience numbers and critical reviewers who labeled it a spectacle “stuck in the past”.
Now, almost a decade later, the showgirl persona, or at least the glamorous showgirl look, is making a comeback.
The Master of Sparkle
Referred to as the “king of sparkle”, Mackie has made theatrical showgirl glamour his signature style, clothing everyone from screen legends to Madonna. Earlier this month, a “barely-there” bodysuit he created for Cher in 1978 sold for $57,600, well over its estimated price, while a silver and gold fringed bodysuit with lamé wings that Mackie designed for Tina Turner for a 1977 concert sold for $19,200.
“I believe it looks more attractive for the emerging artists who is seeking something other than what they grew up with”, he told a newspaper. “New stars are embracing a glamorous, more theatrical, attention-grabbing, memorable statement.”
The Mainstream Comeback
It’s a look that sashayed all the way to the heart of popular culture in 2025 thanks to 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, plumed armbands and shimmering headpiece were tailor-made for a record titled The Life of a Showgirl.
She has company. This year, showgirl inspirations have been embraced by pop stars including Sabrina Carpenter as they zoomed across arena stages in sequins, revealing designs and plumes, illuminated against theatrical sets. Lipa’s stylist her creative director told Vogue he wanted to bring “a showgirl attitude” to her Radical Optimism tour – drawing from pictures from the 50s, Lipa’s dancers wafted giant feathered fans.
Drawing from the Past
Modern stars and other chart toppers also reference classic performances, including vaudeville and ensemble references. The results are poles apart from the 90s Britney Spears era of short shirts and utilitarian trousers, and hip-hop inspired dance moves that came before them.
But not everyone are enthusiastic with this glamour resurgence. Nancy Hardy, a former Jubilee! showgirl who danced in the early 2000s says the trend is “confusing”. She thinks the word showgirl title is being “employed as an broad label encompassing everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now apparently modern pop stars.”
The Coveted Retro Style
For millennial and millennial stars, Mackie’s classic designs have become incredibly sought-after. In 2024, Zendaya honored to one of Mackie’s earliest clients, Cher, when the actress wore a semi-sheer embellished dress made by the designer in 2001, which was inspired by one he made for Cher to wear in 1967. Subsequently, a singer paid an undisclosed sum 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 collection of vintage Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a popular item among collectors.
“The showgirl aesthetic bring about nostalgia for a past glamour,” says Su Kim Chung, head of special collections at the a Las Vegas university, who researches the history of showgirls. “Today it is viewed as a sort of ‘acceptable’ allure because it has been adapted. It has got all the elegance, the rhinestones and the sparkle but without the nudity.”
More Than Just Style: An Symbol of Vegas
She says this figure are integral to the iconography of Las Vegas. She points to ex-mayor Oscar Goodman who, during official events, was accompanied by two showgirls. Although Las Vegas currently lacks any showgirl-centric productions, Chung says they are still used as an logo of the city, appearing at conventions and in marketing. “The showgirl is still a remaining symbol of Vegas spectacle,” she says.
The Allure of Transformation
The former showgirl says the transformative effect of a stage character is part of the allure. This is a notion Swift alludes to in a recent docuseries that documents the behind-the-scenes action from her massive 2023 Eras tour, which included exhausting practice sessions, workouts and 149 concerts across dozens of cities, each going on for 3.5 hours.
The performer recalls her own showgirl performances as “comparable to extreme physical exertion in high heels every night”. Her feathered headdress tipped the scales at 34lbs. “I had to wear it all the way up the stairs to the platform from the dressing rooms three floors below in the lower level. I had to start early for my moment so I could recover before I made my entrance. One is sweating the whole time but creating this fantasy that it’s effortless and gorgeous and dreamlike.”
Maybe this is where the fascination of the showgirl fantasy really resides. In the complexity of 2025 there is a craving for a break from reality. What better figure to turn to than these performers, who have always personified make-believe, flawlessness and a realm where nobody misses a mark.
