Vegas performer hits Taylor Swift with trademark suit over 'Life of a Showgirl'

LOS ANGELES (CN) — A Las Vegas singer, TV host and columnist sued Taylor Swift on Monday, claiming that the megastar’s 2025 “The Life of a Showgirl” album infringes her “Confessions of a Showgirl” trademark.

Maren Wade, who sued under her given name Maren Flagg, says in a complaint filed in Los Angeles federal court that she started using “Confessions of a Showgirl” in 2014 for a column in the Las Vegas Weekly about her life as a performer. She got a trademark for the name in 2015.

“What began as a weekly column became a live show,” Wade says. “The show became a touring production. Over the course of a decade, ‘Confessions of a Showgirl’ grew into a brand encompassing performances, writing, and digital media — built by one person, city by city and show by show.”

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, Wade claims, declined to register Swift’s “The Life of a Showgirl” trademark because it is confusingly similar to her trademark.

“Defendants were therefore placed on actual notice that their chosen designation was likely to be confused with a mark that already belonged to someone else,” Wade says in the complaint. “They continued using it anyway, expanding it across a coordinated commercial program and distributing it through retail channels reaching millions of consumers.”

Wade says that she was never contacted by Swift or her representatives about using the trademark.

Meanwhile, she claims, consumers have in fact been confused as to any affiliation or connection between her and Swift’s use of “The Life of a Showgirl.”

Since Swift’s album was released, multiple instances of actual consumer confusion have been documented across public platforms, including consumers who have referred to the album as “Confessions of a Showgirl” and consumers who have used her trademark as a hashtag when discussing Swift’s album, Wade says.

Online searches for “Confessions of a Showgirl” now return results dominated by content associated with Swift’s album, further compounding consumer confusion, according to Wade.

Because of Swift’s substantially greater commercial scale and use of “The Life of a Showgirl,” the Las Vegas performer says, people will be start to believe that “Confessions of a Showgirl” is somehow affiliated with or derived from Swift.

“Defendants’ conduct threatens to overwhelm plaintiff’s senior mark and to impair plaintiff’s ability to control the identity and goodwill associated with her brand,” Wade says in the complaint.

A representative of Swift didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

“The Life of a Showgirl” is Swift’s 12th studio album. She recorded it in Sweden during the European leg of her Eras Tour.

The album, according to Swift’s website, posted the largest sales week for any album in U.S. music history when it was released on Oct. 3, 2025. It was the artist’s 15th No. 1 album and broke the the record for the most No. 1 albums in the 21st century. It also set the record for the most No. 1 albums by a solo artist.

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