Jubilee!

Reception

When it closed in 2016, this resident show at Bally's Las Vegas was the longest-running production show in Las Vegas. The Jubilee! showgirls were an icon of old Vegas. The show used costumes designed by Bob Mackie and Pete Menefee. There were 36 individual designs, each based on the jewel tones of amethyst, sapphire, emerald, and ruby. UNLV Special Collections houses many of the original costume design drawings which can be accessed online through the Showgirls collection from UNLV Digital Collections.

Many of the show's sets dated back to the original production. Jubilee!'s longest serving principal dancer from the opening night until her departure 23 years later was Linda Green. The final closing cast consisted of 3 female singers, 3 male singers, 18 male dancers, 23 topless dancers, and 19 female dancers. Within the female covered and topless dancers, they were further categorized as "short" and "tall" dancers. A "short" dancer is a female dancer between 5 ft 8 in (173 cm) and 5 ft 9 in (175 cm) and a "tall" female dancer is between 5 ft 10 in (178 cm) and 6 ft 2 in (188 cm). One may have been surprised at how tall the dancers were because of the proportions of the stage, which was three and a half stories high, giving the illusion that the performers are smaller in relationship to the stage.

Lighting designed by Ken Billington.

Acts

• Act 1 Showtime! Putting It into the Right Vernacular
• Act 2 A Specialty Act that varied over the years, toward the end was a hand balancing act
• Act 3 Samson and Delilah Tonight, a Lesson from Ancient History
• Act 4 Another Specialty Act that varied over the years, sometimes a magic act, towards the end was a gaucho act
• Act 5 Titanic Away We Go on the Mighty "Unsinkable" Ocean Liner
• Act 6 Another Specialty Act, towards the end was an aerial act
• Act 7 The Finale A Tribute to Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers

Legacy

Screenwriter Kate Gersten visited the Jubilee! show before it concluded and was inspired to write a play about the dancers in a similar Las Vegas show's closing. That unproduced play became the basis for the screenplay she wrote for the 2024 American drama film The Last Showgirl, directed by Gia Coppola and starring Pamela Anderson as a Vegas showgirl near the end of her career at the closing of a long-running show. The American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift donned the rhinestone-encrusted bra and thong set worn by one of the Jubilee! showgirls, complete with hip swags, a headpiece and feathered armbands, for one of the cover artworks of her twelfth studio album, The Life of a Showgirl (2025).

References

References

1. Phil Konstantin. "Jubilee Dancers at KUSI TV".
2. (15 July 1988). "Donn Arden's Art: Beauty, Disasters Wrapped in Extravagance". Los Angeles Times.
3. UNLV Libraries. "Jubilee!". UNLV Libraries Digital Collections.
4. (11 February 2016). "End of an era: 34-year-old 'Jubilee' concludes — what's next?".
5. (12 December 2015). "'Jubilee' show at Bally's to close after 34-year run".
6. (14 December 2015). "Curtain coming down on 'Jubilee!'--Las Vegas' long-running showgirl revue".
7. Wright, Becky. "Tiffany Coyne the real deal". Standard-Examiner.
8. Merrill, Jane. (2018). "The showgirl costume an illustrated history". McFarland.
9. Liann Hanson. (14 November 2010). "Moonlighting Vegas Cop Takes It Off Onstage".
10. Coppola, Gia. (September 7, 2024). "Pamela Anderson's Role Of A Lifetime In 'The Last Showgirl'". [[Deadline Hollywood]].
11. Jackson, Hannah. (August 19, 2025). "Taylor Swift's showgirl costume has a rich Las Vegas history".
12. https://www.reviewjournal.com/entertainment/entertainment-columns/mike-weatherford/fashionistas/ {{Bare URL inline. (May 2022)