After a three-decade run on the iconic Vegas strip, the performers from the spectacle Jubilee! took a final choreographed kick in 2016. The production, renowned for its elaborate costumes crafted by celebrated designer Bob Mackie, ended its run due to falling audience numbers and critical critics who described it as a spectacle “a relic of another era”.
Currently, roughly eight years later, the showgirl, or at least the showgirl style, is experiencing a revival.
The Master of Sequins
Dubbed the “sultan of sequins”, Mackie has made theatrical stage sparkle his signature style, clothing everyone from Marilyn Monroe to pop royalty. Earlier this month, a “barely-there” bodysuit he designed for Cher in 1978 fetched $57,600, well over its projected value, while a silver and gold fringed bodysuit with shiny wings that Mackie crafted for Tina Turner for a 1977 concert sold for $19,200.
“I believe it looks more enticing for the younger performer who is looking for something other than what they grew up with”, he explained to a newspaper. “Contemporary performers are embracing a glamorous, more theatrical, show-stopping, grand statement.”
The Musical Revival
It’s a look that sashayed all the way to the centre of popular culture in 2025 thanks to a global pop icon. Earlier this year, the cultural juggernaut wore one of Mackie’s original Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her 12th studio album. The rhinestone encrusted bra and thong, feathered armbands and sparkly headpiece were ideal for a record called The Life of a Showgirl.
The singer has company. This year, showgirl references have been adopted by music artists including Sabrina Carpenter as they danced across arena stages in sequins, cut-outs and feathers, spotlighted against theatrical sets. A top stylist her creative director told a style publication he wanted to bring “a stage persona” to her Radical Optimism tour – referencing pictures from the 1950s, Lipa’s dancers waved giant feathered fans.
Pulling from Tradition
Lipa, Carpenter and other chart toppers also draw on classic entertainment forms, including vaudeville and chorus line references. The final look are vastly different from the 1990s era teen pop of short shirts and cargo pants, and hip-hop inspired dance moves that were popular earlier.
But some critics are convinced with this glamour resurgence. Nancy Hardy, a former Jubilee! showgirl who performed in the 2000s says the trend is “puzzling”. She thinks the word term is being “used as an broad label including everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now seemingly today's icons.”
The Coveted Classic Style
For millennial and millennial stars, Mackie’s retro designs have become extremely desirable. In 2024, Zendaya honored to one of Mackie’s earliest clients, Cher, when the actor wore a translucent beaded dress made by the designer in 2001, which was reminiscent of one he made for Cher to wear in 1967. Later that year, a singer 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, Sabrina Carpenter wore a collection of retro Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a popular item among collectors.
“This style inspire nostalgia for a historical elegance,” says a historian, an expert at the an academic institution, who documents the legacy of showgirls. “Today it is considered a sort of ‘toned-down’ appeal because it has been adapted. It has got all the sophistication, the rhinestones and the shine but without the exposure.”
A Than Simply Fashion: An Icon of Las Vegas
Chung says showgirls are key to the imagery of Vegas. She points to one-time leader Oscar Goodman who, during civic functions, was surrounded by two showgirls. While Las Vegas no longer has any showgirl-centric productions, Jung says they are still featured as an emblem of the city, appearing at gatherings and in marketing. “The showgirl is still a lasting symbol of Las Vegas glitz and glamour,” the expert says.
An Allure of Escape
The former showgirl says the transformative effect of a showgirl is part of the attraction. This idea Taylor Swift alludes to in a recent docuseries that shows the off-camera action from her massive 2023 Eras tour, which included exhausting preparations, gym sessions and 149 shows across multiple nations, each lasting 3.5 hours.
She explains her own stage routines as “like completing an endurance race in stilettos every night”. Her headdress tipped the scales at 34lbs. “I had to support it all the way up the staircase to the platform from the backstage area three floors below in the lower level. I had to leave early for my moment so I could rest before I performed. You are perspiring the whole time but maintaining this image that it’s easy and gorgeous and magical.”
Perhaps this is where the true allure of the showgirl fantasy really resides. In the busyness of 2025 there is a longing for a break from reality. What better figure to turn to than these performers, who have always embodied dreams, idealism and a realm where nobody makes a mistake.
