After a 31-year run on the Las Vegas strip, the dancers from the production Jubilee! took a final choreographed kick in 2016. The show, renowned for its intricate costumes crafted by celebrated designer Bob Mackie, came to an end due to falling audience numbers and critical commentators who labeled it a spectacle “stuck in the past”.
Today, roughly eight years later, the showgirl, or at least the showgirl style, is making a comeback.
A Sultan of Sequins
Known as the “king of sparkle”, Mackie has made over-the-top stage sparkle his trademark look, dressing everyone from Hollywood icons to music superstars. Earlier this month, a “see-through” bodysuit he made for Cher in 1978 sold for $57,600, seven times its estimated price, while a metallic beaded bodysuit with shiny wings that Mackie designed for Tina Turner for a 1977 performance sold for $19,200.
“In my view it looks more appealing for the younger performer who is desiring something other than what they knew from childhood”, he told a newspaper. “Today's artists are embracing a show-stopping, more spectacular, breathtaking, grand statement.”
The Pop Culture Revival
It’s a look that glided all the way to the heart of the cultural zeitgeist in 2025 largely due to Taylor Swift. Earlier this year, the music phenomenon wore one of Mackie’s classic Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her new musical project. The rhinestone encrusted bra and thong, ostrich-feather armbands and sparkly headpiece were tailor-made for a record titled The Life of a Showgirl.
Swift is part of a trend. This year, showgirl references have been embraced by music artists including Dua Lipa as they danced across world tours in sparkles, strategic openings and ostrich feathers, spotlighted against theatrical sets. Lipa’s stylist her creative director explained to a fashion magazine he wanted to bring “a showgirl attitude” to her Radical Optimism tour – referencing pictures from the 50s, her performers wafted giant feathered fans.
Drawing from History
Lipa, Carpenter and other successful musicians also reference historical performances, including vaudeville and ensemble references. The outcome are poles apart from the 90s pop style of revealing tops and cargo pants, and street-style dance moves that were popular earlier.
But some critics are on board with this showgirl renaissance. An ex-showgirl, a former Jubilee! showgirl who danced in the early 2000s says the trend is “bemusing”. She thinks the word showgirl is being “employed as an umbrella term covering everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now apparently Taylor Swift.”
A Highly Sought-After Classic Look
For younger and modern stars, Mackie’s retro designs have become highly covetable. In 2024, a style icon honored to one of Mackie’s first major stars, Cher, when the star wore a semi-sheer sequined dress designed by the designer in 2001, which was reminiscent of one he designed for Cher to wear in 1967. Later that year, a singer paid an undisclosed sum to buy the Mackie tasseled mini dress she had worn at an awards show to perform at the Grammys. In September, the singer wore a series of vintage Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a popular item among fashion collectors.
“This style bring about fond memories for a bygone era of glitz,” says an archivist, a curator at the an academic institution, who studies the legacy of showgirls. “Today it is considered a sort of ‘safe’ allure because it has been updated. It has got all the sophistication, the crystals and the sparkle but without the exposure.”
A Than Simply Style: An Icon of Vegas
Chung says the showgirl image 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, Jung says they are still used as an emblem of the city, showing up at conventions and in advertisements. “The showgirl is still a enduring figure of Vegas glitz and glamour,” she says.
An Appeal of Escape
Hardy says the transformative effect of a showgirl persona is part of the attraction. This is a notion Swift references in a new behind-the-scenes film that captures the backstage action from her year-long 2023 Eras tour, which included intense preparations, workouts and 149 performances across multiple nations, each lasting 3.5 hours.
She explains her own stage routines as “similar to running a marathon in high heels every night”. Her headpiece was 34lbs. “I had to carry it all the way up the steps to the performance area from the backstage area three floors below in the lower level. I had to leave early for my moment so I could catch my breath before I made my entrance. You’re perspiring the whole time but maintaining this fantasy that it’s effortless and gorgeous and dreamlike.”
It could be this is where the appeal of the showgirl really is found. In the busyness of 2025 there is a desire for escapism. What better figure to emulate than such icons, who have always embodied make-believe, flawlessness and a world where nobody makes a mistake.
