Various sources are reporting that all appearances of Christopher Lee as Saruman have been cut from The Return of the King. I'm only a middling fan of the movie series (and of the books, for that matter), but even I'm somewhat shocked by this. It's been years since I read the trilogy, but I do remember "The Scouring of the Shire" much more vividly than the rest of the book, and it just doesn't work without Saruman. Predictably, Tolkien fanatics can discuss this development more interestingly than I can.