After a 31-year run on the iconic Vegas strip, the performers from the spectacle Jubilee! took a final perfectly timed kick in 2016. The show, renowned for its elaborate costumes designed by celebrated designer Bob Mackie, came to an end due to dwindling audience numbers and unimpressed critics who described it as a spectacle “a relic of another era”.
Currently, nearly ten years later, the showgirl persona, or at least the glamorous showgirl look, is experiencing a revival.
The King of Sparkle
Known as the “king of sparkle”, Mackie has made over-the-top showgirl glamour his defining aesthetic, dressing everyone from screen legends to music superstars. Recently, a “barely-there” bodysuit he created for Cher in 1978 commanded $57,600, well over its initial estimate, while a silver and gold beaded bodysuit with shiny wings that Mackie created for Tina Turner for a 1977 show sold for $19,200.
“I think it looks more appealing for the younger performer who is desiring something other than what they were accustomed to”, he explained to a media outlet. “Today's artists are embracing a glamorous, more spectacular, attention-grabbing, memorable statement.”
The Mainstream Revival
It’s a look that sashayed all the way to the epicenter of the cultural zeitgeist in 2025 largely due to a chart-topping superstar. Recently, the music phenomenon wore one of Mackie’s vintage Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her 12th studio album. The bedazzled bra and thong, feathered armbands and glittering headpiece were ideal for a record called The Life of a Showgirl.
Swift has company. This year, showgirl inspirations have been embraced by pop stars including Dua Lipa as they whizzed across concert platforms in sequins, strategic openings and plumes, highlighted against theatrical sets. Lipa’s stylist her creative director mentioned in an interview with a fashion magazine he wanted to bring “a showgirl spirit” to her Radical Optimism tour – referencing pictures from the 50s, the backup dancers waved giant feathered fans.
Drawing from History
Lipa, Carpenter and other chart toppers also reference classic performances, including classic theater and chorus line references. The results are worlds away from the late-century pop style of crop tops and utilitarian trousers, and street-style dance moves that came before them.
But not everyone are convinced with this glamour resurgence. A former performer, a ex- Jubilee! showgirl who danced in the 2000s says the trend is “bemusing”. She thinks the word showgirl is being “employed as an catch-all phrase covering everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now even today's icons.”
The Coveted Vintage Style
For gen Z and millennial stars, Mackie’s classic designs have become incredibly sought-after. In 2024, a style icon honored to one of Mackie’s earliest clients, Cher, when the actress wore a translucent embellished dress made by the designer in 2001, which was inspired by one he created for Cher to wear in 1967. Months after, Miley Cyrus paid an significant price to buy the Mackie fringed mini dress she had worn at an awards show to perform at the Grammys. In September, the singer wore a series of retro Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a popular item among vintage enthusiasts.
“Showgirls evoke a sense of longing for a historical elegance,” says a historian, a curator at the a Las Vegas university, who studies the history of showgirls. “Today it is seen as a sort of ‘safe’ sexy because it has been updated. It has got all the sophistication, the rhinestones and the sparkle but without the nudity.”
More Than Simply Fashion: An Symbol of the City
Chung says showgirls are central to the iconography of Las Vegas. She points to ex-mayor Oscar Goodman who, during civic functions, was surrounded by two showgirls. Even though Las Vegas currently lacks any showgirl-centric productions, Chung says they are still used as an logo of the city, appearing at corporate events and in promotional material. “The showgirl is still a remaining symbol of Las Vegas glitz and glamour,” Chung says.
An Appeal of Illusion
The former showgirl says the magical transformation of a stage character is part of the allure. It’s something the singer references in a new behind-the-scenes film that captures the off-camera action from her massive 2023 Eras tour, which included intense rehearsals, gym sessions and 149 concerts across 21 countries, each lasting 3.5 hours.
Hardy explains her own stage routines as “comparable to completing an endurance race in high heels every night”. Her headdress weighed 34lbs. “I had to carry it all the way up the staircase to the stage from the green rooms three floors below in the basement. I had to head up ahead of time for my cue so I could rest before I performed. One is working hard the whole time but crafting this fantasy that it’s effortless and beautiful and ethereal.”
Perhaps this is where the true allure of the showgirl fantasy really is found. In the complexity of 2025 there is a craving for a break from reality. What better figure to look to than these performers, who have always personified fantasy, idealism and a realm where no one makes a mistake.
