When Did Showgirls Go out of Fashion and Why?

I read your three-part series on the future of entertainment with interest, but I couldn't help thinking about the number-one symbol of Las Vegas entertainment in the past, the showgirl. I kept waiting for you to mention that, but there wasn't even one. While I doubt showgirls will return to Las Vegas stages ever again, what happened to them? When did they stop being a thing and why?

As everyone knows, with their towering headdresses and skimpy jewel-encrusted outfits, showgirls were once as much a Las Vegs fixture as slot machines and buffets.

They arrived in 1957, when the Dunes debuted showgirls in Minsky's Follies (which also introduced toplessness to Las Vegas stages), while Lido de Paris began its 31-year run at the Stardust one year later. Soon, every casino showroom needed a showgirl extravaganza, most notable being the Copa girls at the Sands and Folies Bergere at the Tropicana.

The typical showgirl was a member of a huge chorus of statuesque rhinestone-adorned women (topless and otherwise) wearing chandeliers on their heads and doing things on huge staircases with enormous ostrich-feather fans and five sets of false eyelashes, among other subtleties. (For two years, 2008-2010, Bette Midler’s The Showgirl Must Go On residency at the Colosseum at Caesars was an excellent send-up of the old chorus-line tradition; Bette did 300 of those shows that grossed $75 million.)

Folies Bergere was put out of its misery in March 2009 after a 49-year run, leaving Jubilee! as the sole survivor of the era. Jubilee! featured million-dollar sets, lavish costumes, and the showgirl parade; it closed in February 2016 after 35 years at Bally’s.

Like fashion, tastes in entertainment are highly changeable and the over-the-top Las Vegas spectaculars and extravaganzas were destined to be replaced by Cirque acrobats, big-name acts, the high-tech presentations we covered in detail in our recent future-of-entertainment series, and small shows.

Of course, Vegas wouldn’t be Vegas without showgirls, even today, and they do continue to show(girl) up here and there. You’ll still see ex-mayor Oscar Goodman doing photo ops with a classic showgirl on each arm and a martini in hand. When a new airline flies into Reid International for the first time, at least a couple of showgirls are there to greet the plane. And enterprising young women in showgirl costumes pose for photographs with visitors at the Bellagio fountains, alongside Spiderman, Darth Vader, and SpongeBob SquarePants; you can also find them on Fremont Street.

One place where the showgirl tradition lives on with a vengeance is Las Vegas Showgirl Museum, which features 40,000 items gathered over the past four decades by Grant Philipo, who also books showgirl “rentals” garbed in his collection of costumes (250 mannequins’ worth) for special events.

So yes, the days of the Las Vegas showgirl appearing en masse in front of big audiences in Las Vegas showrooms and theaters are bygone. However, though they might be an endangered species, they’re not, by any means, extinct yet.

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Doozey Jul-07-2022

up close and...

I was in the parking garage elevator between Paris and Bally's with two showgirls on their home. One still had stage makeup on, both were in street clothes. Very skinny. Better seen from afar.

AL Jul-15-2022

just commenting . . .

Notice that it was always "showGIRLS", never "showGUYS".  Any idea as to why?  And wasn't that sexist/discriminatory?
Also, I've never understood the concept of "topless showgirls". Why in the world would a showgirl need a little spinning toy while she's on stage?

Kevin Lewis Jul-15-2022

Variation on the theme

The horror/comedy film, "Headless Showgirls," starring Roseanne Barr and Vin Diesel, with a cameo appearance by Ru Paul, sadly never made it into theaters. Possibly because due to budget constraints, it was set in Vegas but actually filmed in Oklahoma City.

JimBeam Jul-15-2022

VGK Showgirls

You forgot about the showgirls that are part of the VGK home games. During warm-ups they put them on the *visitor* side to distract the players. Never change, Las Vegas :)

gaattc2001 Jul-15-2022

A relative of mine danced in the Follies at the Tropicana...

in the late 60's/early 70's. Not topless, but definitely with one of those 10-pound headdresses. Times were different then. Howard Hughes had just arrived only a few years earlier, and the corporate takeover was just beginning. 
My impression was that almost all of those "feather shows" lost money, and they were considered just another loss-leader to get people in the door and into the proper festive mood. Fifty years later, the bean-counters have fixed that.

ThinkerT Jul-15-2022

@AL RE: Showguys

The same reason why there are FAR more strip clubs with performing women than men - demand. And I'm assuming that the courts wouldn't find that any more discriminatory than those clubs only hiring women or Hooters hiring only woman waitresses.

jay Jul-15-2022

Liability

Anytime you deal with the topless you risk legal ramifications from multiple angles  The entertainers could be harassed - even before they are on the books - starting at the talent agency casting couch onwards. You deal with those who may have other vices that they are feeding and stripping down is just a fast track source of income, subsequently their off stage behavior becomes a liability, not to mention reliability. Those who then may be released due to their vices start to make  make false accusations. Lots of broad generalizations here but issues abound.

Per places like hooters - (also known as Breastrants) which also extend to LV waiters/waitresses at the pool parties are all hired as entertainers vs servers so they can pick and choose based on physical attractiveness - or a particular set of measurements.

Sally_Ann Jul-15-2022

Soon to be gone forever

Leave it to the Woke Brigade to eliminate showgirls altogether.

Doc H Jul-15-2022

Sally

I think you're right Sally. I think the woke crew "running' the nation these days can't even seem to even define what a woman is these days with a straight face, so how in the world would they feel about the term and job showgirls? Ban the word, ban the job, right? And men can have babies after all I'm told by many in this crew so using that flow of thought or whatever it's called, showgirls is probably an insult term these days, so perhaps it will be soon named as They-People-Show? It-Her-That-Binary-Thingy-Show? Perhaps ask lewis and company on this board who wanted this crew to run things for the details on what the definition of a woman is, how insulting the term "showgirl" is to get an insight on the new insanity game we are in. But I think they will probably give a Magoo type answer also and stumble on a woke word game salad and end it with a classy fist bump.

Walter Suttle Jul-15-2022

Woke

Sorry Sally and Doc, woke didn’t have Jack to do with showgirls. It was bean counters and solely bean counters, as explicitly stated in the answer. Another attempt to make everything political l

Doc H Jul-15-2022

1 answer Walter?

So this one answer is the sole final answer, 100%? And no one can disagree and suggest other contributing factors aren't in play here to some degree? Life is seldom so cut and dry. And this has nothing to do with primarily politics, at least my comment, though one side of the coin seems to use it and push it, there's no doubt about that. What it has mostly to do with is the reality of where 'woke' society is in the US in many quarters and has been going full speed the last few years and how it indeed could have very well impacted the demise of the showgirl. Las Vegas has a large younger population visiting now so you need to catch up on what many of them believe and how words, especially pronouns,  are used and what words are becoming 'banned' and are being filed in the "ist" category. This is reality. And it's not an exaggeration. If you're up there in age a bit, talk to some younger relatives, nephews, nieces, to know what's going on. You really need to catch up.

Roy Furukawa Jul-15-2022

Wow! 2016?

I am shocked to find out that Jubilee! lasted until 2016. I would have bet (and lost as is usual when it comes to Las Vegas) that all of the big shows featuring showgirls were gone long before that.

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