After a three-decade run on the iconic Vegas strip, the showgirls from the spectacle Jubilee! took a final perfectly timed kick in 2016. The production, famous for its ornate costumes designed by style icon Bob Mackie, came to an end due to falling audience numbers and unimpressed reviewers who called it a spectacle “stuck in the past”.
Currently, nearly ten years later, the showgirl, or at least the glamorous showgirl look, is back.
A King of Glitz
Dubbed the “king of sparkle”, Mackie has made dramatic showgirl glitz his defining aesthetic, dressing everyone from Hollywood icons to pop royalty. Recently, a “barely-there” bodysuit he created for Cher in 1978 commanded $57,600, seven times its projected value, while a metallic beaded bodysuit with shiny wings that Mackie created for Tina Turner for a 1977 show sold for $19,200.
“I think it looks more enticing for the younger performer who is looking for something other than what they were accustomed to”, he stated in an interview with a media outlet. “Contemporary performers are pushing toward a glamorous, more theatrical, show-stopping, grand statement.”
A Pop Culture Revival
It’s a look that made its way all the way to the epicenter of mainstream fashion in 2025 propelled by a global pop icon. Earlier this year, the cultural juggernaut wore one of Mackie’s original Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her latest record. The rhinestone encrusted bra and thong, plumed armbands and sparkly headpiece were ideal for a record named The Life of a Showgirl.
Swift isn't alone. This year, showgirl inspirations have been adopted by music artists including Miley Cyrus as they whizzed across world tours in glitter, cut-outs and plumes, illuminated against camp sets. Her fashion curator Lorenzo Posocco explained to Vogue he wanted to bring “a showgirl spirit” to her Radical Optimism tour – drawing from pictures from the mid-century, the backup dancers wafted giant ostrich feather fans.
Pulling from the Past
These artists and other chart toppers also take inspiration from classic entertainment forms, including vaudeville and chorus line references. The final look are vastly different from the 1990s era pop style of crop tops and cargo pants, and urban dance moves that were popular earlier.
But some critics are enthusiastic with this glamour resurgence. A former performer, a one-time Jubilee! showgirl who danced in the early 2000s says the trend is “bemusing”. She thinks the word term is being “used as an umbrella term encompassing everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now apparently today's icons.”
A Coveted Vintage Style
For younger and millennial stars, Mackie’s classic designs have become highly covetable. In 2024, a famous actress paid tribute to one of Mackie’s first major stars, Cher, when the star wore a translucent embellished dress created by the designer in 2001, which was similar to one he made for Cher to wear in 1967. Later that year, a singer paid an private amount to buy the Mackie beaded 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 favorite among collectors.
“Showgirls inspire nostalgia for a past glamour,” says Su Kim Chung, an expert at the an academic institution, who documents the history of showgirls. “Today it is considered a sort of ‘safe’ allure because it has been updated. It has got all the glamour, the crystals and the shine but without the bare skin.”
More Than Simply Fashion: An Icon of Las Vegas
She says showgirls are key to the iconography of Las Vegas. She points to former mayor Oscar Goodman who, during civic functions, was accompanied by two showgirls. Even though Las Vegas does not host any showgirl-based productions, Chung says they are still employed as an symbol of the city, appearing at corporate events and in advertisements. “The showgirl is still a remaining symbol of Las Vegas glamour,” Chung says.
An Appeal of Illusion
Nancy Hardy says the transformative effect of a stage character is part of the appeal. It’s something Taylor Swift alludes to in a latest docuseries that captures the off-camera action from her massive 2023 Eras tour, which included exhausting preparations, training and countless concerts across multiple nations, each lasting 3.5 hours.
She recalls her own stage routines as “like extreme physical exertion in stilettos every night”. Her feathered headdress tipped the scales at 34lbs. “I had to carry it all the way up the steps to the stage from the backstage area three floors below in the basement. I had to start early for my cue so I could recover before I performed. You are sweating the whole time but creating this fantasy that it’s easy and stunning and magical.”
It could be this is where the fascination of the showgirl really resides. In the chaos of 2025 there is a longing for fantasy. Who better to look to than showgirls, who have always embodied dreams, perfection and a universe where no one falters.
