Kate Gosselin to Tony on 'Dancing With The Stars': 'A lot of people quit on me in life'

Yikes. Dancing With The Stars “shopping cart” Kate Gosselin reduced her partner Tony Dovolani first to quivering rage and then to quivering apology before their jive-in-every-sense dance on Monday night.

In the taped rehearsal segment before their performance, Kate was shown asking Tony for more detailed instructions, and after a while, Dovolani expressed his frustration to the camera by saying, “Nothing in dancing is natural to Kate.” Getting hot under the collar, he chafed, “I’ve never been questioned in my teaching,” and finally: “I quit.” He walked out, while Kate looked at her camera and said, over and over, “I don’t get it.”

Wait a minute: This was a Monday night, on TV, and Kate Gosselin was making a male partner feel frustration and rage at her constant hectoring? For a second there, I thought ABC had unearthed unseen footage from TLC’s Jon & Kate Plus 8.

After a commercial, more tape rolled and we saw Tony come back and apologize. Kate “forgave” him by saying, “A lot of people quit on me in life.”

Then they danced to the Elton John hit, “I’m Still Standing.”

I’m not going to recap the performance, or the rest of the show. Annie Barrett has her usual peerless analysis of the entire DWTS two-hour edition here.

But as a long-time Kate Gosselin observer, I have a few bullet points:

• No matter how nice she seemed sitting at the table on The View and in other post-Jon media appearances, when she’s under pressure, Kate just can’t help being herself. To some observers, that just means she’s human and honest; to others, it means she’s reason to flee a room.

• Random fact: Yesterday was Kate’s birthday (she’s 35). It was also Lady Gaga’s (24th). So much for astrology.

• Earlier today I discovered that Kate’s been blogging about her DWTS experience — yes, she’s tapping out entries for the network that seems to own her soul, TLC/Discovery. In her latest entry, she writes, “In my lifetime I have never awakened my creative expressive side,” and then continues that she’s “still in shock that, I, Kate Gosselin, am learning to dance… and then performing for 24 million live viewers.” She adds that she now has dreams about her partner Tony, “my dance instructor, partner, psychotherapist, caffeine provider and friend.”

She dreams; Tony, I’d wager, has nightmares.

I’m not a regular DWTS viewer, which means I’m part of the reason ABC is getting such big ratings for the new season by casting such disparate people as Kate Gosselin, Pam Anderson, and Buzz Aldrin.

So you tell me: Do these kinds of fights and fireworks occur all the time on DWTS? And tell me what you thought of the Kate Gosselin portion of the show. Annie Barrett’s full recap is now up and running.