Classic showgirls need to be a minimum of 5’8” with many shows requiring 5’10” but preferably 6’ or over. The height requirement is not only to create a statuesque presence on stage but also for the girls to be able to wear the elaborate and very heavy costumes, sometimes up to 75+ pounds, and then move with elegance and grace while dancing.

Showgirls must have dance training - it is not a matter of just walking gracefully across the stage. The showgirls are required to have legitimate dance training to be able to perform the elaborate choreographed dance numbers which means the #1 requirement is ballet, then contemporary dance/jazz, tap and even modern dance.

Ballet originated in the 15th century Italian Renaissance Courts and was further developed in the 17th century French Courts – thus the terms to describe ballet are in French. Ballet Girls - was the label used in the early 1800s for young dancing girls performing on stage, mostly in Parisian music halls and cabarets, the three most notable: 1869 Folies Bergère, 1889 Moulin Rouge (best known for the Can Can); 1946 Le Lido, of which all three "music halls" are still in business and are still known for employing stunning showgirls.

London had the famous Gaiety Girls from 1860-1910 who were the chorus girls at the London Gaiety Theatre. In American, from 1907 –1931, was the reign of Florenz Ziegfeld - sometimes referred to as the man that invented Show Business. Ziegfeld was inspired by the Parisian Folies Bergère and created his own version of the elaborate stage-spectacular in New York: The Ziegfeld Follies with Glorifying the American Girl. Showgirls came to the Silver Screen most notably with Movie Musicals, and the unsurpassed champion of producing the best movie musical was MGM Studios, of which there were three films created in tribute to Florenz Ziegfeld: The Great Ziegfeld 1936, Ziegfeld Girl 1941 and Ziegfeld Follies 1946.

During the 1950s, the Las Vegas casinos were attempting to top each other by making their shows as lavish and memorable as possible - which included showgirls wearing enormous feathered headdresses and exquisite custom-made costumes. These early Showgirl Chorus Lines were usually the opening and closing act for Las Vegas headliners – most famously Jack Entratter's Copa Girls at the Sands. Then Harold Minsky, in his Minsky’s Follies at the Dunes Casino in 1967 introduced the first topless Vegas showgirls, modeled after the Parisian nightclub shows. 1955 was the start of a series of imports of Parisian cabarets shows to LV when Donn Arden was instrumental in bringing the long-running Lido de Paris to the Stardust that ran for 31 years closing in 1990. Lou Walters, Barbara Walter's father, was the entertainment director at the Las Vegas Tropicana and Walters brought in the Folies Bergère from Paris with the show opening in 1959 and a version of that show (created by Jerry Jackson) playing for 49 years, closing in 2009, with the distinction of being the longest running show in Las Vegas history. 1963, Frederic Apcar brought the Parisian production spectacular Casino de Paris to the Dunes showroom. So in the 1950s and 1960s - with showgirls in almost every hotel and casino on strip - The Showgirl became the unofficial Icon of Las Vegas.

MGM Movie Studio was purchased by Nevada millionaire Kirk Kerkorian in 1969. What appealed to Kerkorian was the value (at that time) of 45 years’ worth of glamour that was associated with the MGM name, which Kerkorian then attached to two Nevada hotel casinos – one in Las Vegas and one in Reno. Kerkorian then hired Donn Arden to produce lavish stage shows based on the classic MGM Hollywood Movies plus paying tribute to Florenz Ziegfeld – both Reno and Las Vegas theaters and stages were named: The Ziegfeld Theatre and The Ziegfeld Stage. Arden partnered with Margaret Kelly, better known as Miss Bluebell. Donn Arden and Miss Bluebell are both featured on this site, so I will not go into their history other than to add that Donn Arden was the creative genius that ushered in the iconic Las Vegas BIG lavish stage shows. Again, Arden was inspired by and paid tribute to both MGM movies and Ziegfeld in the three world-famous shows he created for MGM: Las Vegas Hallelujah Hollywood 1974-1980, Reno Hello Hollywood Hello 1978-1989 and Jubilee 1981 which ended its 35-year run on February 11, 2016 as the Last Showgirl Show in Las Vegas!