Initially, Baxter's pseudonym has a rather innocuous purpose: to present a more attractive image than the reality. Baxter exchanges his real name (whether it's simply common or even unappealing) for an alliterative stage name in order to attract and hold an audience's attention. This sort of vanity is illustrated in the scene where he discovers that someone (Jimmy, unbeknownst to Baxter) has scribbled over his face on the movie posters he's hung in his cabin. At first, he's upset, but when he sees his face with a moustache drawn on it, he entertains the notion, pulling out his comb and placing the end under his nose to try it out. Obviously, he's concerned with how he looks to others.
Later, Baxter himself points out this disparity between image and reality. When he suggests calling off the rescue party for Ann Darrow (whom the islanders abducted and offered to Kong) and returning to the ship, the script writer Jack Driscoll tells him, "I always knew you were nothing like the tough guy you play on screen. I just never figured you for a coward." Baxter replies, "Hey, pal! Hey, wake up. Heroes don't look like me, not in the real world. In the real world, they got bad teeth, a bald spot, and a beer gut. I'm just an actor with a gun who's lost his motivation. Be seein' ya."
Near the end of the movie, the scope of Baxter's pretence expands beyond just his fake name. After Kong has been captured and taken to New York, director Carl Denham presents him in a show in which he introduces Baxter as "the real-life hero of this story, the man who hunted down the mighty Kong, the man who risked all to win the freedom of a helpless female." This description actually applies more to Driscoll than to Baxter, who was the first to abandon the search for Darrow. Baxter's alliterative stage name continues to present a pleasant image (as does the spotless white safari uniform he wears), but in adopting this hero title, he goes even further in deceiving the audience and actively conceals the truth.
