After a 31-year stint on the Las Vegas Boulevard, the performers from the revue Jubilee! executed their last perfectly timed kick in 2016. The show, renowned for its elaborate costumes designed by American fashion designer Bob Mackie, ended its run due to falling audience numbers and critical reviewers who labeled it a spectacle “stuck in the past”.
Now, roughly eight years later, showgirls, or at least the showgirl aesthetic, is making a comeback.
A Master of Glitz
Dubbed the “sultan of sequins”, Mackie has made dramatic stage sparkle his signature style, clothing everyone from screen legends to Madonna. In a recent auction, a “naked” bodysuit he made for Cher in 1978 commanded $57,600, far exceeding its initial estimate, while a silver and gold fringed bodysuit with shiny wings that Mackie created for Tina Turner for a 1977 show sold for $19,200.
“I believe it looks more attractive for the emerging artists who is looking for something other than what they knew from childhood”, he told a media outlet. “Today's artists are pushing toward a glamorous, more dramatic, show-stopping, entrance-making statement.”
The Pop Culture Revival
It’s a look that sashayed all the way to the heart of popular culture in 2025 largely due to Taylor Swift. Recently, the entertainment titan wore one of Mackie’s classic Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her 12th studio album. The rhinestone encrusted bra and thong, plumed armbands and glittering headpiece were tailor-made for a record called The Life of a Showgirl.
She has company. This year, glamorous nods have been incorporated by singers including Sabrina Carpenter as they whizzed across concert platforms in sparkles, strategic openings and plumes, highlighted against camp sets. A top stylist a fashion expert told a fashion magazine he wanted to bring “a showgirl attitude” to her Radical Optimism tour – inspired by pictures from the 1950s, her performers fluttered giant plumed accessories.
Pulling from History
Lipa, Carpenter and other successful musicians also reference historical entertainment forms, including vaudeville and ensemble references. The outcome are vastly different from the 90s Britney Spears era of short shirts and utilitarian trousers, and urban dance moves that came before them.
But certain observers are on board with this showgirl renaissance. A former performer, a former Jubilee! showgirl who performed in the early 2000s says the trend is “confusing”. She thinks the word showgirl title is being “treated as an umbrella term including everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now even Taylor Swift.”
A Coveted Retro Style
For younger 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 actress wore a see-through beaded dress made by the designer in 2001, which was reminiscent of one he designed for Cher to wear in 1967. Months after, a singer paid an private amount 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 collection of vintage Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a hit among vintage enthusiasts.
“This style bring about fond memories for a bygone era of glitz,” says a historian, head of special collections at the an academic institution, who studies the legacy of showgirls. “Currently it is seen as a sort of ‘safe’ sexy because it has been adapted. It has got all the sophistication, the sparkles and the shine but without the exposure.”
A Than Just Style: An Symbol of Vegas
Chung says showgirls are central to the iconography of Vegas. She points to former mayor Oscar Goodman who, during public appearances, was accompanied by two showgirls. Although Las Vegas does not host any showgirl-based productions, Chung says they are still used as an logo of the city, appearing at corporate events and in advertisements. “The showgirl is still a enduring icon of Las Vegas glitz and glamour,” she says.
The Appeal of Transformation
Hardy says the complete change of a showgirl is part of the allure. This idea the singer alludes to in a new behind-the-scenes film that captures the behind-the-scenes action from her extensive 2023 Eras tour, which included gruelling rehearsals, training and numerous shows across multiple nations, each going on for 3.5 hours.
She explains her own nights in the spotlight as “like completing an endurance race in high heels every night”. Her headdress was 34lbs. “I had to carry it all the way up the staircase to the stage from the backstage area three floors below in the underground. I had to leave early for my moment so I could recover before I went on stage. You’re working hard the whole time but creating this image that it’s simple and gorgeous and dreamlike.”
It could be this is where the appeal of the showgirl fantasy really is found. In the complexity of 2025 there is a longing for escapism. Is there anyone better to emulate than such icons, who have always embodied dreams, flawlessness and a world where no one misses a mark.