You can create a Note Report that filters for Note > Note Text > Contains > PM Status Update and then group the results by Project Name, however, that will pull in all PM Status Updates, not necessarily just the last one.
I know you mentioned you didn't want to go the route of a custom field because you wanted historical information to be kept, but this would be an add-on. PM Status Updates can still be added to the updates area so you have the full history, but when you want to share the report out with leadership/management, you can type in an update that potentially combines multiple updates, summarizes what has been shared, adds to, offers more detail, etc.