AR has read the books, well, at least DH!

[Carol]

Carol earlier:
<snip>
> I've also read somewhere that Christopher Lee, who reads the books once a year and is thoroughly familiar with them, made a number of suggestions, some of which were acted upon, for scenes involving other actors. And I know that a similar creative process was used in the filming of the 1998 TV movie "Moby Dick," for which all the major actors read the book. (The writer and director still made changes to the original book, of course, but they did so as a team with the actors, not as dictators or puppetmasters, and like Jackson's team, they continued to revise the script as they filmed.)
> 
> Carol, who will add more links if she finds any good ones

Carol again:

Found this tidbit about sixteen paragraphs from the bottom of the Trivia section of Christopher Lee's IMDb page:

"As a veritable J.R.R. Tolkien expert and the only member of the cast who had met Tolkien himself, he often visited the Production department on the sets of the various "Lord of the Rings" movies to give advice and tips on the various attributes of the films."

http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0000489/bio

Carol, who now pictures Saruman as Christopher Lee

Although info from the IMDb isn't always accurate, I know I've read the same thing elsewhere.