After a long-running tenure on the iconic Vegas strip, the showgirls from the revue Jubilee! gave one last synchronised kick in 2016. The extravaganza, famous for its intricate costumes crafted by style icon Bob Mackie, came to an end due to falling audience numbers and critical commentators who labeled it a spectacle “trapped in time”.
Now, roughly eight years later, showgirls, or at least the showgirl aesthetic, is experiencing a revival.
The Master of Glitz
Dubbed the “king of sparkle”, Mackie has made over-the-top showgirl glamour his trademark look, clothing everyone from screen legends to Madonna. In a recent auction, a “barely-there” bodysuit he made for Cher in 1978 fetched $57,600, seven times its estimated price, while a silver and gold tasseled bodysuit with lamé wings that Mackie designed for Tina Turner for a 1977 show sold for $19,200.
“I think it looks more appealing for the emerging artists who is desiring something other than what they were accustomed to”, he stated in an interview with a newspaper. “Contemporary performers are embracing a show-stopping, more spectacular, attention-grabbing, entrance-making statement.”
The Musical Resurgence
It’s a look that made its way all the way to the epicenter of mainstream fashion in 2025 largely due to a global pop icon. In the past few months, the music phenomenon wore one of Mackie’s classic Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her latest record. The crystal-covered bra and thong, ostrich-feather armbands and glittering headpiece were perfect for a record titled The Life of a Showgirl.
She has company. This year, glamorous nods have been embraced by music artists including Dua Lipa as they danced across concert platforms in sparkles, revealing designs and ostrich feathers, illuminated against overstated sets. A top stylist her creative director told Vogue he wanted to bring “a stage persona” to her Radical Optimism tour – referencing pictures from the 1950s, the backup dancers wafted giant ostrich feather fans.
Drawing from the Past
Lipa, Carpenter and other successful musicians also reference 19th-century entertainment forms, including vaudeville and dance line references. The outcome are vastly different from the 1990s era pop style of short shirts and cargo pants, and urban dance moves that preceded this trend.
But certain observers are convinced with this showgirl revival. Nancy Hardy, a one-time Jubilee! showgirl who entertained in the early 2000s says the trend is “bemusing”. She thinks the word term is being “used as an umbrella term including everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now apparently today's icons.”
A Coveted Vintage Look
For millennial and modern stars, Mackie’s retro designs have become incredibly sought-after. In 2024, Zendaya honored to one of Mackie’s iconic muses, Cher, when the actor wore a semi-sheer beaded dress created by the designer in 2001, which was inspired by one he made 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 previously to perform at the Grammys. In September, the singer wore a collection of vintage Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a favorite among fashion collectors.
“The showgirl aesthetic bring about a sense of longing for a historical elegance,” says a historian, an expert at the University of Nevada, who researches the story of showgirls. “Today it is viewed as a sort of ‘acceptable’ allure because it has been modified. It has got all the glamour, the rhinestones and the glitter but without the bare skin.”
A Than Just Style: An Symbol of Vegas
She says this figure are central to the iconography of Vegas. She points to ex-mayor Oscar Goodman who, during official events, was flanked by two showgirls. Although Las Vegas currently lacks any showgirl-based productions, Jung says they are still used as an emblem of the city, appearing at conventions and in promotional material. “The showgirl is still a lasting figure of Vegas glitz and glamour,” Chung says.
The Appeal of Transformation
Nancy Hardy says the magical transformation of a stage character is part of the appeal. It’s something Taylor Swift references in a latest behind-the-scenes film that shows the off-camera action from her year-long 2023 Eras tour, which included intense preparations, workouts and 149 performances across dozens of cities, each going on for 3.5 hours.
Hardy recalls her own nights in the spotlight as “like extreme physical exertion in heels every night”. Her headpiece weighed 34lbs. “I had to wear it all the way up the staircase to the performance area from the dressing rooms three floors below in the lower level. I had to leave early for my cue so I could rest before I performed. You’re sweating the whole time but creating this illusion that it’s effortless and gorgeous and dreamlike.”
Perhaps this is where the true allure of the showgirl really resides. In the busyness of 2025 there is a desire for a break from reality. Is there anyone better to turn to than showgirls, who have always represented fantasy, flawlessness and a world where no one makes a mistake.
