After a long-running run on the Las Vegas Boulevard, the dancers from the spectacle Jubilee! took a final perfectly timed kick in 2016. The show, renowned for its elaborate costumes crafted by American fashion designer Bob Mackie, closed its doors due to dwindling audience numbers and critical critics who described it as a spectacle “stuck in the past”.
Currently, roughly eight years later, the showgirl persona, or at least the glamorous showgirl look, is experiencing a revival.
The Master of Sparkle
Known as the “king of sparkle”, Mackie has made over-the-top showgirl glitz his trademark look, clothing everyone from Hollywood icons to pop royalty. Earlier this month, a “naked” bodysuit he created for Cher in 1978 sold for $57,600, seven times its estimated price, while a shimmering fringed bodysuit with shiny wings that Mackie created for Tina Turner for a 1977 show sold for $19,200.
“In my view it looks more enticing for the younger performer who is desiring something other than what they were accustomed to”, he explained to a publication. “New stars are striving for a glamorous, more theatrical, attention-grabbing, entrance-making statement.”
A Pop Culture Revival
It’s a look that made its way all the way to the centre of the cultural zeitgeist in 2025 propelled by a chart-topping superstar. Recently, the cultural juggernaut wore one of Mackie’s vintage Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her new musical project. The rhinestone encrusted bra and thong, ostrich-feather armbands and glittering headpiece were tailor-made for a record called The Life of a Showgirl.
The singer isn't alone. This year, showgirl inspirations have been embraced by pop stars including Sabrina Carpenter as they whizzed across world tours in sequins, strategic openings and plumes, illuminated against overstated sets. Her fashion curator her creative director told a style publication he wanted to bring “a stage persona” to her Radical Optimism tour – inspired by pictures from the 50s, Lipa’s dancers wafted giant feathered fans.
Drawing from Tradition
These artists and other successful musicians also reference historical entertainment forms, including burlesque and dance line 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 were popular earlier.
But some critics are enthusiastic with this glamour resurgence. A former performer, a ex- Jubilee! showgirl who entertained in the 2000s says the trend is “bemusing”. She thinks the word showgirl title is being “treated as an broad label covering everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now even today's icons.”
The Coveted Retro Style
For millennial and modern stars, Mackie’s vintage designs have become extremely desirable. In 2024, a style icon paid tribute to one of Mackie’s iconic muses, Cher, when the actor wore a see-through sequined dress created by the designer in 2001, which was inspired by one he created for Cher to wear in 1967. Subsequently, Miley Cyrus paid an significant price to buy the Mackie beaded mini dress she had worn at an awards show to perform at the Grammys. In September, Carpenter wore a series of retro Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a favorite among collectors.
“Showgirls bring about a sense of longing for a historical elegance,” says a historian, head of special collections at the a Las Vegas university, who studies the history of showgirls. “Today it is viewed as a sort of ‘safe’ appeal because it has been adapted. It has got all the elegance, the rhinestones and the sparkle but without the nudity.”
More Than Just Fashion: An Icon of Vegas
She says showgirls are integral to the iconography of Sin City. She points to one-time leader Oscar Goodman who, during civic functions, was flanked by two showgirls. Although Las Vegas no longer has any showgirl-centric productions, Jung says they are still used as an logo of the city, being present at conventions and in promotional material. “The showgirl is still a enduring figure of Las Vegas spectacle,” the expert says.
An Appeal of Illusion
Hardy says the magical transformation of a showgirl is part of the allure. This is a notion Taylor Swift references in a new docuseries that documents the backstage action from her year-long 2023 Eras tour, which included exhausting preparations, gym sessions and numerous performances across multiple nations, each lasting 3.5 hours.
The performer recalls her own showgirl performances as “comparable to extreme physical exertion in stilettos every night”. Her headdress tipped the scales at 34lbs. “I had to wear it all the way up the steps to the performance area from the dressing rooms three floors below in the basement. I had to leave early for my cue so I could recover before I made my entrance. One is sweating the whole time but crafting this illusion that it’s effortless and gorgeous and magical.”
Maybe this is where the fascination of the showgirl really resides. In the complexity of 2025 there is a longing for escapism. Who better to turn to than such icons, who have always embodied make-believe, flawlessness and a world where nobody makes a mistake.
