What Is Bob Mackie's Net Worth?
Bob Mackie is an American fashion designer who has a net worth of $10 million. Bob Mackie is known for dressing celebrities and entertainment icons such as Cher, Carol Burnett, Barbara Eden, RuPaul, Diana Ross, Bette Midler, Liza Minnelli, Judy Garland, Joan Rivers, and Tina Turner. Bob served as the costume designer for the entire 11-season run of "The Carol Burnett Show" (1967–1978), and he designed costumes for the spin-off "Mama's Family," which ran from 1983 to 1990. Mackie also worked as a costume designer for "The Sonny and Cher Show" from 1976 to 1977, and he designed the costumes for many of Cher's concert tours. In 1982, Mattel released a line of collectible Bob Mackie Barbies, and in the '90s, Bob launched the QVC Wearable Art Collection. Mackie has earned nine Primetime Emmys and a Tony for his designs as well as three Academy Award nominations, and he was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame in 2002.
Early Life
Bob Mackie was born Robert Gordon Mackie on March 24, 1939, in Monterey Park, California. He is the son of Mildred Agnes Smith and Charles Robert Mackie, and he has an older sister. Charles was employed by Bank of America, and after he and Mildred divorced, Bob was raised by his maternal grandparents in Alhambra during his early childhood. As a teenager, Mackie lived in Rosemead with his father, and after graduating from Rosemead High School, he briefly attended Pasadena City College and Chouinard Art Institute. While attending Chouinard, Bob studied with fashion design department head Eva Roberts, and he left early to take a job at Paramount Studios sketching for Frank Thompson. From 1960 to 1963, Mackie worked under designer Ray Aghayan as an assistant and novice designer at Paramount Studios.
Career
In the early '60s, Bob was discovered by Paramount costumer Edith Head, and early in his career, he was a sketch artist for Jean Louis, an Academy Award-winning fashion designer and haute couturier who created gowns for Marlene Dietrich during her days as a cabaret singer. One of Mackie's earliest assignments for Louis was to draw the original sketch of the dress Marilyn Monroe wore to President John F. Kennedy's 1962 birthday celebration. In 1966, Mitzi Gaynor hired Bob to design the costumes for her Las Vegas stage show, and Mackie and Mitzi continued to work together over the next five decades. Bob won Primetime Emmys for his work on two of Mitzi's TV specials. In 1969, he was hired to design costumes for the NBC special "GIT: On Broadway," which starred Diana Ross & The Supremes as well as The Temptations, and the special earned Mackie an Emmy. In 1972, he and Ray Aghayan received an Academy Award nomination for Ross' film "Lady Sings The Blues," and Bob designed costumes for Diana's "More Today Than Yesterday: The Greatest Hits Tour" in 2010.
Getty Images
Mackie designed costumes for the "Hallelujah Hollywood" and "Jubilee!" burlesque shows in Las Vegas, and many of his design sketches for those shows were featured in the UNLV Libraries Digital Collections. When working on "The Carol Burnett Show," Bob designed a "curtain dress" for a "Gone with the Wind" parody, and it became one of his best-remembered designs. He designed several evening gowns for Whitney Houston, and in 2020, Vanna White wore his designs on "Wheel of Fortune" during a week of shows celebrating the San Francisco Bay Area. Mackie has been called "the rajah of rhinestones" and "the sultan of sequins," and he has said of his designs, "A woman who wears my clothes is not afraid to be noticed."
Personal Life
Bob married singer/actress LuLu Porter on March 14, 1960, and their son Robert (better known as "Robin") was born on October 15, 1959. Robin grew up to become a makeup artist, and sadly, he passed away from an AIDS-related illness in 1993. Mackie and Porter divorced in 1963, and around this time, Bob began a relationship with Ray Aghayan, staying together until Ray's death from a heart attack in 2011.
Awards and Nominations
In 2019, Mackie won a Tony for Best Costume Design in a Musical for "The Cher Show." He has been nominated for Best Costume Design Academy Awards for "Lady Sings the Blues" (1973), "Funny Lady" (1976), and "Pennies from Heaven" (1982), and he was honored with the Costume Designers Guild Awards' Disaronno Career Achievement in Television Award in 1999 and the American Choreography Awards' Governor's Award in 2001. Bob has earned more than 30 Primetime Emmy nominations, winning for Individual Achievements in Art Direction and Allied Crafts – Costume Design for "Alice Through the Looking Glass" (1967), Outstanding Achievement in Costume Design for "G.I.T. on Broadway" (1970), Outstanding Costume Design for a Variety or Music Program for "Mitzi… Roarin' in the 20's" (1976), "Mitzi… Zings Into Spring" (1978), "Carol & Company" (1991), "Men, Movies & Carol" (1995), "Cher: Live in Concert from Las Vegas" (2000), and "Cher: The Farewell Tour" (2003), and Outstanding Costume Design for a Series for "Mama's Family" (1984). In 2002, he was inducted into the Primetime Emmy Television Hall of Fame, and in 2005, he received a TV Land Award Legend Award for "The Carol Burnett Show," along with Carol Burnett, Tim Conway, Harvey Korman, Vicki Lawrence, and Lyle Waggoner.
Real Estate
In 1993, Bob sold his Beverly Hills mansion and Los Angeles studio for $850,000. In 2006, he paid $1.7 million for a home in the Laurel Hills neighborhood of Los Angeles. He sold the five-bedroom, 3,500 square foot home for $2.1 million in 2016. In 2020, Mackie purchased a home in South Palm Springs for $825,000.
