Following a three-decade run on the Las Vegas strip, the performers from the revue Jubilee! took a final choreographed kick in 2016. The show, renowned for its ornate costumes created by American fashion designer Bob Mackie, ended its run due to falling audience numbers and critical reviewers who described it as a spectacle “a relic of another era”.
Currently, roughly eight years later, the showgirl persona, or at least the showgirl aesthetic, is back.
A King of Sparkle
Dubbed the “sultan of sequins”, Mackie has made dramatic stage sparkle his trademark look, dressing everyone from Marilyn Monroe to music superstars. In a recent auction, a “naked” bodysuit he designed for Cher in 1978 sold for $57,600, seven times its estimated price, while a silver and gold fringed bodysuit with shiny wings that Mackie crafted for Tina Turner for a 1977 performance sold for $19,200.
“In my view it looks more attractive for the emerging artists who is seeking something other than what they grew up with”, he explained to a media outlet. “Contemporary performers are striving for a glamorous, more spectacular, attention-grabbing, entrance-making statement.”
A Pop Culture Resurgence
It’s a look that glided all the way to the heart of mainstream fashion in 2025 largely due to a global pop icon. Earlier this year, the music phenomenon wore one of Mackie’s original Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her latest record. The crystal-covered bra and thong, ostrich-feather armbands and sparkly headpiece were perfect for a record called The Life of a Showgirl.
The singer has company. This year, glamorous nods have been incorporated by pop stars including Dua Lipa as they danced across arena stages in sequins, strategic openings and feathers, illuminated against theatrical sets. Lipa’s stylist Lorenzo Posocco told Vogue he wanted to bring “a showgirl attitude” to her Radical Optimism tour – drawing from pictures from the mid-century, Lipa’s dancers fluttered giant feathered fans.
Drawing from the Past
Lipa, Carpenter and other successful musicians also reference historical entertainment forms, including burlesque and chorus line references. The final look are poles apart from the late-century teen pop of short shirts and cargo pants, and urban dance moves that preceded this trend.
But some critics are on board with this showgirl renaissance. An ex-showgirl, a one-time Jubilee! showgirl who performed in the 00s says the trend is “puzzling”. She thinks the word showgirl is being “used as an umbrella term encompassing everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now seemingly today's icons.”
A Highly Sought-After Vintage Look
For gen Z and millennial stars, Mackie’s retro designs have become extremely desirable. In 2024, Zendaya honored to one of Mackie’s first major stars, Cher, when the actress wore a semi-sheer beaded dress designed by the designer in 2001, which was similar to one he created for Cher to wear in 1967. Months after, Miley Cyrus paid an undisclosed sum to buy the Mackie tasseled mini dress she had worn earlier in the year to perform at the Grammys. In September, Sabrina Carpenter wore a collection of vintage Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a hit among fashion collectors.
“This style evoke a sense of longing for a bygone era of glitz,” says a historian, head of special collections at the a Las Vegas university, who documents the story of showgirls. “Now it is viewed as a sort of ‘acceptable’ appeal because it has been updated. It has got all the sophistication, the sparkles and the sparkle but without the bare skin.”
More Than Just Fashion: An Icon of the City
She says this figure are integral to the imagery of Las Vegas. She points to former mayor Oscar Goodman who, during official events, was surrounded by two showgirls. Although Las Vegas does not host any showgirl-centric productions, Jung says they are still used as an emblem of the city, showing up at corporate events and in marketing. “The showgirl is still a remaining icon of Las Vegas glitz and glamour,” Chung says.
The Allure of Transformation
Nancy Hardy says the magical transformation of a stage character is part of the allure. This is a notion Swift references in a recent behind-the-scenes film that captures the backstage action from her extensive 2023 Eras tour, which included gruelling rehearsals, workouts and numerous concerts across multiple nations, each lasting 3.5 hours.
Hardy explains her own stage routines as “similar to completing an endurance race in high heels every night”. Her headdress tipped the scales at 34lbs. “I had to support it all the way up the steps to the stage from the green rooms three floors below in the lower level. I had to leave early for my entrance so I could rest before I went on stage. You’re working hard the whole time but crafting this fantasy that it’s effortless and beautiful and magical.”
Maybe this is where the appeal of the showgirl really resides. In the complexity of 2025 there is a craving for a break from reality. Who better to look to than such icons, who have always personified fantasy, perfection and a universe where no one falters.
