🔗 Share this article

After a three-decade tenure on the Las Vegas Boulevard, the showgirls from the production Jubilee! took a final synchronised kick in 2016. The production, famous for its intricate costumes created by style icon Bob Mackie, ended its run due to declining audience numbers and unimpressed commentators who called it a spectacle “trapped in time”.

Now, almost a decade later, showgirls, or at least the showgirl aesthetic, is experiencing a revival.

A King of Glitz

Referred to as the “sultan of sequins”, Mackie has made dramatic stage sparkle his defining aesthetic, dressing everyone from Marilyn Monroe to pop royalty. Recently, a “naked” bodysuit he designed for Cher in 1978 commanded $57,600, seven times its projected value, while a shimmering 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 enticing for the emerging artists who is desiring something other than what they were accustomed to”, he explained to a newspaper. “New stars are pushing toward a theatrical, more spectacular, attention-grabbing, entrance-making statement.”

The Musical Comeback

It’s a look that sashayed all the way to the heart of popular culture in 2025 propelled by a global pop icon. Recently, the entertainment titan wore one of Mackie’s classic Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her latest record. The rhinestone encrusted bra and thong, ostrich-feather armbands and shimmering headpiece were tailor-made for a record called The Life of a Showgirl.

She has company. This year, glamorous nods have been embraced by music artists including Dua Lipa as they whizzed across world tours in sparkles, strategic openings and ostrich feathers, illuminated against overstated sets. A top stylist a fashion expert told a style publication he wanted to bring “a stage persona” to her Radical Optimism tour – referencing pictures from the 50s, her performers wafted giant ostrich feather fans.

Drawing from Tradition

These artists and other successful musicians also take inspiration from 19th-century performances, including vaudeville and ensemble references. The final look are poles apart from the 1990s era Britney Spears era of crop tops and cargo pants, and hip-hop inspired dance moves that preceded this trend.

But some critics are convinced with this showgirl revival. A former performer, a former Jubilee! showgirl who performed in the early 2000s says the trend is “bemusing”. She thinks the word term is being “used as an broad label encompassing everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now even today's icons.”

The Coveted Classic Style

For millennial and young adult stars, Mackie’s classic designs have become extremely desirable. In 2024, a famous actress honored to one of Mackie’s earliest clients, Cher, when the actress wore a translucent embellished dress made by the designer in 2001, which was similar to one he made for Cher to wear in 1967. Months after, Miley Cyrus paid an undisclosed sum to buy the Mackie beaded 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.

“The showgirl aesthetic inspire a sense of longing for a historical elegance,” says a historian, an expert at the an academic institution, who documents the story of showgirls. “Today it is viewed as a sort of ‘acceptable’ allure because it has been modified. It has got all the sophistication, the rhinestones and the glitter but without the nudity.”

A Than Just Fashion: An Symbol of Vegas

She says the showgirl image are integral 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 traditional showgirl productions, Chung says they are still featured as an logo of the city, being present at corporate events and in marketing. “The showgirl is still a enduring figure of Vegas glitz and glamour,” Chung says.

The Appeal of Illusion

Nancy Hardy says the transformative effect of a showgirl persona is part of the appeal. This is a notion Swift alludes to in a recent behind-the-scenes film that documents the behind-the-scenes action from her extensive 2023 Eras tour, which included intense rehearsals, gym sessions and numerous concerts across multiple nations, each going on for 3.5 hours.

The performer recalls her own showgirl performances as “like completing an endurance race in heels every night”. Her headpiece weighed 34lbs. “I had to support it all the way up the staircase to the performance area from the backstage area three floors below in the lower level. I had to start early for my moment so I could catch my breath before I performed. One is sweating the whole time but crafting this fantasy that it’s easy and stunning and magical.”

Maybe this is where the appeal of the showgirl fantasy really is found. In the complexity of 2025 there is a longing for fantasy. What better figure to look to than showgirls, who have always personified fantasy, perfection and a world where no one falters.