Actress Melanie Griffith lived with a pet lion in the early 1970s when she was a teenager. And now photos have emerged of their amazing home life together.

When Griffith was a teenager, her actress mother, Tippi Hedren, and her stepfather, director Noel Marshall, decided they wanted to make a film about big cats after returning from a trip to Africa and seeing them in person. An animal trainer suggested they get to know them better by living with a lion, so they ended up taking Neil into their home.