Melanie Griffith Shares Rare Glimpse of Mom Tippi Hedren as She Turns 95

Melanie Griffith is celebrating mom Tippi Hedren’s 95th birthday!

Griffith, 67, took to Instagram late Monday, January 20, to share a rare glimpse of her retired actress mom, who turned 95 on Sunday, January 19.

In a video shared by Griffith, Hedren can be seen blowing out her birthday candles and waving to the camera. The legendary actress had her hair in a sleek bob cut and sported red lipstick for her birthday celebrations.

“My beautiful Mama turned 95 yesterday! 🥰♥️🥰♥️🥰 She’s happy, healthy and feisty!!” Griffith captioned the video.

Hedren was famously discovered in the 1960s by horror director Alfred Hitchcock, who cast her in The Birds. She also appeared in Hitchcock’s thriller Marnie (1964) and, more recently, in the 2004 comedy I Heart Huckabees.

Hedren shares Griffith with her first husband, Peter Griffith, and is the grandmother of actress Dakota Johnson.

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In addition to acting, Hedren is a passionate animal rights activist. In the 1970s, she had a 400-pound pet lion, Neil, with whom she and a teenage Griffith were famously pictured for a Life magazine photo shoot. Hedren has since expressed remorse over allowing Neil to roam free around her home, admitting that it was “stupid beyond belief.”

In a 2020 interview, Johnson, 35, revealed that her grandmother was still looking after big cats at her Shambala Preserve in California at the age of 90.

“She has 13 or 14,” Johnson said on The Graham Norton Show. “There used to be like 60 cats, and now there’s just a couple.”

Asked if she too grew up living with lions and tigers, Johnson said, “By the time I was born they were all in huge compounds and it was a lot safer. It wasn’t as totally psycho as it was when they first started.”

Hedren set up her own animal charity, the Roar Foundation, in 1983 after producing and starring in the film Roar, appearing opposite several African lions. The foundation exists to support her animal reserve and according to Hedren, its “mission is to educate the public about the dangers of private ownership of exotic animals.”