Some executives, speaking on condition of anonymity to protect their relationships with those who vote for prizes, have said in the last few weeks that they do not expect their studios to make any movie in the foreseeable future as a specific Oscar bet.

If honors happen to come, as they came to “The Departed,” a Warner film that was a surprise best-picture winner in 2007, so be it. But few are looking to make the next “Frost/Nixon,” a smart, critically acclaimed film that got Ron Howard a nomination as best director this year.

“Frost/Nixon” has taken in less than $20 million at the domestic box office, and may not make a profit when the cost of its long Oscar-season promotional campaign is added to its relatively modest $25 million budget.

AS little as a year ago, the prestige that came with an Oscar contender could seem worth at least a small financial loss to studios that could always make up for it with their summer hits.

In tougher times, not so.

Already, 20th Century Fox and Columbia Pictures have become only occasional players in the Oscar game, allowing associated specialty units, Fox Searchlight and Sony Pictures Classics, to be contenders with relatively small films.

If companies like Paramount, Universal and the now-smaller DreamWorks also step back, the academy — protective of an enterprise that brings it more than $70 million a year — will almost certainly start looking for adjustments to a system that still needs big stars and the big studios that pay them.

The last significant structural change to the Oscars occurred in 2004, when they were moved up a month, to late February from late March. The shift was meant to lighten the expense and fatigue factor of a movie awards season that was then consuming nearly half the year. The next step could well be Oscars in January. That idea has been popping up in conversation here lately.

One version suggests compressing the Oscars into the tail end of a two-week, festival-like Hollywood awards event that would include the Golden Globes and all the various guild awards, and take place in early to mid-January.

Studios could fly in their talent just once, instead of three or four times. And companies could generate a whole new kind of excitement by throwing all their dollars into one concentrated burst of movie awards advertising.