After a three-decade tenure on the Las Vegas strip, the performers from the revue Jubilee! took a final choreographed kick in 2016. The production, renowned for its intricate costumes created by style icon Bob Mackie, ended its run due to declining audience numbers and disappointed reviewers who called it a spectacle “stuck in the past”.
Today, roughly eight years later, showgirls, or at least the glamorous showgirl look, is back.
The Sultan of Glitz
Dubbed the “master of glitz”, Mackie has made dramatic showgirl glamour his defining aesthetic, dressing everyone from Hollywood icons to pop royalty. Earlier this month, a “see-through” bodysuit he designed for Cher in 1978 commanded $57,600, well over its estimated price, while a silver and gold fringed bodysuit with shiny wings that Mackie crafted for Tina Turner for a 1977 show sold for $19,200.
“I think it looks more enticing for the new generation of stars who is seeking something other than what they were accustomed to”, he explained to a media outlet. “New stars are pushing toward a show-stopping, more spectacular, attention-grabbing, entrance-making statement.”
The Mainstream Revival
It’s a look that glided all the way to the heart of popular culture in 2025 thanks to a global pop icon. Earlier this year, the cultural juggernaut wore one of Mackie’s classic Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her 12th studio album. The bedazzled bra and thong, ostrich-feather armbands and shimmering headpiece were perfect for a record called The Life of a Showgirl.
Swift isn't alone. This year, glamorous nods have been adopted by singers including Dua Lipa as they danced across concert platforms in sequins, strategic openings and feathers, spotlighted against camp sets. Lipa’s stylist a fashion expert mentioned in an interview with a fashion magazine he wanted to bring “a stage persona” to her Radical Optimism tour – referencing pictures from the 50s, Lipa’s dancers fluttered giant plumed accessories.
Pulling from History
Modern stars and other chart toppers also reference 19th-century entertainment forms, including burlesque and chorus line references. The outcome are worlds away from the late-century Britney Spears era of crop tops and utilitarian trousers, and urban dance moves that came before them.
But not everyone are enthusiastic with this glamour resurgence. Nancy Hardy, a former Jubilee! showgirl who performed in the early 2000s says the trend is “confusing”. She thinks the word term is being “used as an catch-all phrase covering everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now even today's icons.”
The Highly Sought-After Retro Look
For gen Z and millennial stars, Mackie’s vintage designs have become extremely desirable. In 2024, a style icon honored to one of Mackie’s earliest clients, Cher, when the actor wore a semi-sheer embellished dress designed by the designer in 2001, which was inspired by one he made for Cher to wear in 1967. Months after, another pop star 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, Carpenter wore a trio of retro Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a popular item among vintage enthusiasts.
“This style evoke nostalgia for a bygone era of glitz,” says Su Kim Chung, an expert at the an academic institution, who studies the story of showgirls. “Now it is viewed as a sort of ‘safe’ allure because it has been adapted. It has got all the elegance, the rhinestones and the glitter but without the bare skin.”
More Than Just Style: An Icon of Las Vegas
The expert says showgirls are central to the imagery of Sin City. She points to former mayor Oscar Goodman who, during public appearances, was flanked by two showgirls. Although Las Vegas currently lacks any traditional showgirl productions, Jung says they are still used as an symbol of the city, showing up at conventions and in advertisements. “The showgirl is still a remaining icon of Las Vegas glitz and glamour,” the expert says.
The Appeal of Escape
Nancy Hardy says the magical transformation of a stage character is part of the attraction. This is a notion the singer alludes to in a latest docuseries that captures the off-camera action from her extensive 2023 Eras tour, which included exhausting preparations, gym sessions and 149 concerts across dozens of cities, each lasting 3.5 hours.
The performer recalls her own nights in the spotlight as “like completing an endurance race in heels every night”. Her headdress weighed 34lbs. “I had to support it all the way up the steps to the platform from the backstage area three floors below in the basement. I had to head up ahead of time for my entrance so I could rest before I made my entrance. You are working hard the whole time but maintaining this image that it’s easy and stunning and ethereal.”
Maybe this is where the true allure of the showgirl really resides. In the chaos of 2025 there is a desire for escapism. What better figure to look to than showgirls, who have always personified dreams, flawlessness and a realm where nobody misses a mark.
