After a long-running run on the Las Vegas strip, the dancers from the spectacle Jubilee! took a final perfectly timed kick in 2016. The show, known for its intricate costumes created by celebrated designer Bob Mackie, came to an end due to dwindling audience numbers and unimpressed reviewers who labeled it a spectacle “a relic of another era”.
Now, roughly eight years later, the showgirl persona, or at least the showgirl style, is making a comeback.
The Master of Glitz
Dubbed the “sultan of sequins”, Mackie has made theatrical showgirl glamour his defining aesthetic, outfitting everyone from screen legends to music superstars. Recently, a “barely-there” bodysuit he designed for Cher in 1978 sold for $57,600, well over its initial estimate, while a shimmering fringed 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 emerging artists who is desiring something other than what they knew from childhood”, he told a publication. “Contemporary performers are embracing a glamorous, more theatrical, show-stopping, memorable statement.”
The Pop Culture Comeback
It’s a look that sashayed all the way to the centre of popular culture in 2025 thanks to Taylor Swift. Recently, the entertainment titan wore one of Mackie’s vintage Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her latest record. The crystal-covered bra and thong, ostrich-feather armbands and shimmering headpiece were perfect for a record named The Life of a Showgirl.
The singer has company. This year, showgirl references have been adopted by singers including Dua Lipa as they danced across arena stages in sequins, revealing designs and feathers, highlighted against theatrical sets. Her fashion curator her creative director mentioned in an interview with a style publication he wanted to bring “a showgirl attitude” to her Radical Optimism tour – inspired by pictures from the 1950s, her performers wafted giant ostrich feather fans.
Drawing from the Past
These artists and other chart toppers also reference classic entertainment forms, including vaudeville and ensemble references. The outcome are worlds away from the 1990s era Britney Spears era of short shirts and utilitarian trousers, and hip-hop inspired dance moves that preceded this trend.
But certain observers are enthusiastic with this showgirl renaissance. A former performer, a former Jubilee! showgirl who danced in the early 2000s says the trend is “confusing”. She thinks the word term is being “used as an broad label covering everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now seemingly Taylor Swift.”
The Coveted Classic Look
For millennial and modern stars, Mackie’s classic designs have become highly covetable. In 2024, a style icon paid tribute to one of Mackie’s earliest clients, Cher, when the star wore a see-through beaded dress created by the designer in 2001, which was similar to one he made for Cher to wear in 1967. Months after, another pop star 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, Carpenter wore a trio of vintage Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a popular item among vintage enthusiasts.
“Showgirls inspire nostalgia for a past glamour,” says a historian, head of special collections at the a Las Vegas university, who researches the legacy of showgirls. “Currently it is seen as a sort of ‘toned-down’ allure because it has been updated. It has got all the elegance, the sparkles and the sparkle but without the bare skin.”
A Than Just Style: An Symbol of the City
She says the showgirl image are integral to the iconography of Las Vegas. She points to ex-mayor Oscar Goodman who, during public appearances, was accompanied by two showgirls. Although Las Vegas currently lacks any showgirl-based productions, Jung says they are still employed as an logo of the city, appearing at corporate events and in marketing. “The showgirl is still a remaining icon of Las Vegas glamour,” the expert says.
The Allure of Illusion
Nancy Hardy says the transformative effect of a showgirl persona is part of the appeal. This is a notion Taylor Swift alludes to in a new behind-the-scenes film that captures the behind-the-scenes action from her massive 2023 Eras tour, which included intense practice sessions, training and numerous performances across multiple nations, each going on for 3.5 hours.
Hardy recalls her own stage routines as “similar to running a marathon in stilettos every night”. Her headdress weighed 34lbs. “I had to carry 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 head up ahead of time for my cue so I could rest before I went on stage. You are working hard the whole time but crafting this image that it’s easy and gorgeous and dreamlike.”
It could be this is where the true allure of the showgirl really resides. In the complexity of 2025 there is a longing for escapism. Is there anyone better to look to than such icons, who have always personified dreams, perfection and a universe where nobody falters.
