After a 31-year tenure on the Las Vegas strip, the performers from the revue Jubilee! executed their last perfectly timed kick in 2016. The extravaganza, famous for its ornate costumes crafted by celebrated designer Bob Mackie, ended its run due to falling audience numbers and critical commentators who called it a spectacle “stuck in the past”.
Today, almost a decade later, showgirls, or at least the showgirl style, is making a comeback.
A King of Sequins
Dubbed the “king of sparkle”, Mackie has made over-the-top stage sparkle his trademark look, clothing everyone from screen legends to Madonna. In a recent auction, a “barely-there” bodysuit he designed for Cher in 1978 fetched $57,600, seven times its estimated price, while a metallic 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 knew from childhood”, he told a newspaper. “New stars are embracing a glamorous, more spectacular, show-stopping, memorable statement.”
A Mainstream Comeback
It’s a look that made its way all the way to the epicenter of mainstream fashion in 2025 propelled by Taylor Swift. In the past few months, the music phenomenon wore one of Mackie’s vintage Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her 12th studio album. The crystal-covered bra and thong, feathered armbands and glittering headpiece were perfect for a record named The Life of a Showgirl.
She has company. This year, showgirl inspirations have been incorporated by music artists including Sabrina Carpenter as they danced across arena stages in sequins, strategic openings and ostrich feathers, highlighted against camp sets. Her fashion curator Lorenzo Posocco told a fashion magazine he wanted to bring “a showgirl spirit” to her Radical Optimism tour – inspired by pictures from the 50s, Lipa’s dancers wafted giant feathered fans.
Drawing from Tradition
Modern stars and other chart toppers also draw on 19th-century entertainment forms, including vaudeville and dance line references. The results are vastly different from the 90s teen pop of revealing tops and baggy pants, and hip-hop inspired dance moves that came before them.
But some critics are enthusiastic with this glamour resurgence. A former performer, a one-time Jubilee! showgirl who performed in the 00s says the trend is “bemusing”. She thinks the word term is being “treated as an umbrella term including everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now even modern pop stars.”
A Coveted Classic Style
For millennial and young adult stars, Mackie’s vintage designs have become extremely desirable. In 2024, a style icon paid tribute to one of Mackie’s earliest clients, Cher, when the actress wore a translucent beaded dress made by the designer in 2001, which was similar to one he designed for Cher to wear in 1967. Months after, Miley Cyrus paid an significant price to buy the Mackie beaded mini dress she had worn earlier in the year to perform at the Grammys. In September, Carpenter wore a series of classic Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a popular item among collectors.
“This style evoke a sense of longing for a past glamour,” says Su Kim Chung, head of special collections at the a Las Vegas university, who documents the legacy of showgirls. “Currently it is considered a sort of ‘acceptable’ sexy because it has been updated. It has got all the elegance, the crystals and the glitter but without the nudity.”
More Than Just Style: An Symbol of Las Vegas
Chung says this figure are key to the identity of Las Vegas. She points to one-time leader Oscar Goodman who, during civic functions, was accompanied by two showgirls. While Las Vegas no longer has any traditional showgirl productions, Jung says they are still featured as an emblem of the city, appearing at gatherings and in promotional material. “The showgirl is still a remaining icon of Vegas spectacle,” the expert says.
An Appeal of Transformation
Hardy says the transformative effect of a showgirl persona is part of the allure. It’s something Swift alludes to in a latest behind-the-scenes film that captures the off-camera action from her extensive 2023 Eras tour, which included exhausting preparations, training and numerous shows across multiple nations, each running for 3.5 hours.
Hardy explains her own showgirl performances as “similar to completing an endurance race in high heels every night”. Her headpiece tipped the scales at 34lbs. “I had to wear it all the way up the steps to the performance area from the green rooms three floors below in the lower level. 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 crafting this illusion that it’s simple and stunning and dreamlike.”
Perhaps this is where the true allure of the showgirl really resides. In the complexity of 2025 there is a craving for a break from reality. Is there anyone better to emulate than these performers, who have always embodied fantasy, flawlessness and a realm where no one falters.
