Quoted from Pinister:

That was me, No I dont speak out my rear end. I spoke to Jack at Automated. It was not just Smaug but the entire theme. He stated to me that they had worked on Smaug for months in getting him to interact and steal the balls, they spent a lot of time and money, But when it was presented, WB would not let them do it. It went all the way to the Top. There were even video clips they had to take out. He even stated when they were trying to design Smaug before the release. They saw Smaug on the tail of a plane and asked if they could use that as a design and they were told NO! They ended up having to change the entire thing. Basicly PJ and Tolkien had the final say and it was Tolkiens Baby and he said No! Sounded to me like they were total control freaks.