For decades, one of Atlanta's most famous residents lived in a cage and mostly ate bananas. Now Willie B., a beloved gorilla who died eight years ago, has become the posthumous star of a TV documentary.

The hourlong production explores how the ape _ who spent much of his life in a dingy, cramped space _ helped inspire officials to modernize what is known nowadays as Zoo Atlanta.

When the city's outdated zoo was named one of the country's 10 worst in the 1980s, Willie B.'s plight galvanized the city and then-Atlanta mayor Andrew Young into renovating the attraction rather than closing it for good.

The film, part of a series produced by Young on Africa's connection to the United States, will air this weekend in Atlanta and eventually in nearly 100 other markets, including Los Angeles, New York and Washington, D.C.

The documentary follows Young to Rwanda to see Willie's distant relatives, who live in the remote Virunga Mountains near the border with Uganda and the Congo.

The western lowland gorilla, named for former Atlanta Mayor William B. Hartsfield, was captured in the Congo in the 1960s at age 2. Sent to Atlanta, the gorilla lived in a cage of concrete and steel bars. His only companion was his zookeeper, Charles Horton, along with a tire swing and a TV set.

"He had a personality," Young said of the gorilla. "Women would throw him kisses and he'd come up to the window and press his lips on it. He interacted with the people."

The documentary shows Willie as a young ape staring out of his cage, then his first moments outdoors in the zoo's new primate habitat in 1988.

Young said he hopes the film will encourage zoos that still keep their animals in cages to install natural habitats. As Atlanta mayor in the 1980s, Young hired new zoo management and pushed to raise funds to modernize the zoo.

After the zoo's bottom-rung ranking, the city issued a $20 million bond to begin replacing cages with natural habitats, giving the animals fresh air, grass, trees and room to move. Willie went outside for the first time since his capture in May 1988.

Soon, the zoo began allowing Willie B. to socialize with females in hopes he would reproduce.

There were a few unsuccessful tries _ and billboards throughout Atlanta asked "Willie or won't he?" _ before the gorilla eventually fathered five offspring.

Horton, now curator of primates at the zoo, said the documentary captures the changes in Willie B. and the zoo: "It's a story of turning around the zoo and turning around the life of a very lonely animal."

Willie B.'s popularity would never wane afterward.

Thousands began showing up every year to serenade Willie B. on his birthday and eat cake. When the 439-pound patriarch of Zoo Atlanta's gorilla clan died in 2000 after complications from pneumonia, more than 8,000 mourners packed Zoo Atlanta for a tearful memorial.

Now his ashes rest inside a life-size bronze statue near the zoo's primate habitat.

"His name was really a household word for 30 years or more," Horton said. "Everybody knew who he was."

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On the Net:

Zoo Atlanta: http://www.zooatlanta.org